Gener8 Maritime Sees Red Ink amid Weak Charter Rates

Business & Finance

Due to a significant decrease in time charter rates, the US-based crude oil shipping company Gener8 Maritime ended the third quarter of 2016 with a net loss of USD 37.4 million, compared to a net income of USD 33.2 million seen in the same period a year earlier.

Gener8 Maritime said that its vessel operating days increased by 42.% to 3,157 in the three months ended September 30, 2016 compared to 2,224 in the same quarter in 2015.

The company’s average daily spot TCE rates for the VLCC fleet, including its vessels that were within Navig8 pools, plunged to USD 27,493 for the three month-period, representing a drop of 50.8% compared to USD 55,847 reported in the same period in the prior year.

The average daily TCE rate obtained on a full-fleet basis decreased by 38.2% to USD 21,887 for the third quarter, compared to USD 35,422 for the corresponding quarter in 2015.

“In the third quarter, we continued our fleet renewal program with the sale of two 2001-built VLCCs. At the same time, we expanded our fleet with the delivery of four ECO VLCCs in the third quarter and two more in the fourth quarter,” Peter Georgiopoulos, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Gener8 Maritime, said.

Namely, the company sold the 2001-built VLCC tankers Genmar Vision and Genmar Victory for gross proceeds of USD 28 million and USD 29 million.

Additionally, Gener8 Maritime took delivery of four ECO newbuilding VLCCs, the Gener8 Chiotis, the Gener8 Macedon, the Gener8 Perseus and the Gener8 Oceanus, during the third quarter of 2016 and the Gener8 Miltiades and Gener8 Noble subsequent to the end of the quarter.

“Following the completion of our newbuilding program expected early next year, the dwt-weighted average age of our fleet will be 5.9 years, and our VLCCs will have an average age of just 3.1 years, giving us the youngest and most modern VLCC fleet among our public company peers,” Georgiopoulos added.

Following the delivery of the Gener8 Noble in early November, which entered into the VL8 Pool, 17 of the company’s 21 ECO VLCCs have been delivered.

As of November 7, 2016, the company borrowed around USD 52.5 million under the Korean Export Credit Facility to fund the delivery of the Gener8 Noble. The company has made all shipyard installment payments and there is no outstanding payable balance in respect of the Gener8 Noble.