Let’s turn now to the cash flow statement. After an adjusted EBITDA of €114.7 million, the level of CapEx is €27.9 million. And then you can see here a working capital inflow of €6.1 million in the period, which I will cover in detail on the next slide. You have also a higher level of interest paid, about €41 million and this is mainly due to the interest rates over the period that has been raised over the period. Then, the strategic equity investments from Tencent, that has been done in November and that resulted in an inflow of €45 million. You can also see here the cost related to our refinancing for about €24 million. Finally, our net debt has improved by €41.2 million. Let’s turn now to the next slide in order to have a look on the working capital dynamics.
As a reminder, our working capital is driven by timing difference between the moments we proceed the refunds that we make to the international travelers and the moment we receive VAT payments from merchant and tax authorities. We typically refund travelers on average 30 to 45 days before we are paid by the merchant or authorities. As a result, we experienced cash flow seasonality through the year with a larger net working capital needed during spring summer months, when international shoppers travel more frequently followed by working capital and wind during autumn winter season, our low season. As we have seen the travel industry recover, we have also seen a significant increase in volume, which lead to a much higher working capital need. You can see here, where we add a particularly high outflow of €43 million during the nine months previous year, meaning financial year ’22, ’23 where we were in full recovery.
Now, we are in a more settled environment. You can see this stabilize with a more balanced working capital needed during spring and summer followed by working capital excess during the autumn, which has led here to a €6 million inflow but definitely we can say that, we are in a business with working capital neutrals. Now turning to an analysis of our net debt position. As of 31 December 2023, our net financial debt amounted to €508.6 million including cash and cash equivalent of €101.4 million. You can see here that there has been a strong improvement of the net leverage ratio, which was mentioned in this introduction by Jacques. So from 6.5x at the end of March ’23 we are now at 3.6x at the end of December ’23. As a reminder, in November, we took the opportunity to renegotiate our senior debt to strengthen the balance sheet with, at the end, meaningfully deleverage the group.
The refinancing was closed on the beginning of December and with a senior debt at €610 million with maturity of seven years and the revolving credit facility at €97.5 million which was not drawn at the end of December. Turning now to the key takeaways. First, we are pleased to report a solid recovery with significant increase of 41% of our revenue, which lands at €370 million. Then thanks to the strong revenue growth and ongoing management on the cost base, we are pleased to record a strong improvement in nine months on our adjusted EBITDA. We are at about €115 million, an increase of c% versus the same period last year and a drop through of almost 63% in adjusted EBITDA. On that basis, if we analyze the adjusted EBITDA based on the quarterly performance of the group, there is an acceleration in nine months at €159 million.
And to strengthen the balance sheet, the group refinanced its total indebtedness with a senior debt of €610 million and a revolving credit facility of €97.5 million. This is in place until 2030. Finally, we have delivered a strong key improvement in the net leverage ratio to 3.6x and this is reiterating our objective of being below 2.5x. So this concludes the financial section. And I will now hand over to Jacques to present the latest trends in the long term growth of Nobel.
Jacques Stern: Thank you, Roxane. So quick update on the latest trends namely January 2024, we have seen a profitable solid performance an improvement versus Q3. We can see here the figures with 7 point improvement of recovery in Europe, 11 points in APAC. So, it’s a good dynamic in January. If we go in detail in Page 25, you can see that in Europe we have reached now 125% recovery to be compared to 118% in Q3 and this is led in particular by an increase of the spend of 34%. If we look in terms of number of international shopper, we still are below 2019 at 93%. If we go now into the detail of the nationality coming to Europe, continental Europe as a destination, I think I will make a few comments there. First, we are seeing and I have a few slides for you in the coming second.
On the U.S., we’re seeing a U.S. holding firm SAME for the Gulf country both nationality or group of nationality being around 275% to 300% recovery versus 2019, very strong, and also worse to mention that Mainland China, who used to represent 25% of the spend in 2019 have seen in January an acceleration from 58% in Q3 to 80%. So, those will be the two focus that I would like to share with you. Starting by the American, we are seeing that despite some weakness in terms of consumer demand domestically in the U.S., the international spends are very strong. So, 290% in January, which is driven by a recovery very strong in terms of number of shoppers, almost 200%, namely 195% and also a strong increase of the spend of American going and shopping in Europe at 49%, leading to this 290% recovery of the spend versus 2019.
