Navig8 Chemical Tankers Sees Income Rise

 

Continued growth of the company’s operating fleet with the delivery of Navig8 Turquoise, a 49,000 DWT IMO2 Interline-coated chemical tanker and Navig8 Sirius, a 25,000 DWT stainless steel chemical tanker, in the second quarter of 2016 and Navig8 Topaz, a -49,000 DWT IMO2 Interline-coated chemical tanker in July 2016.

 

It has secured $286.2 million to finance the company’s newbuilding program.

 

Navig8 has issued $93 million in amortizing notes due 2027, guaranteed by The Export-Import Bank of Korea (KEXIM) with an interest rate fixed at 2.9 percent per annum.

 

“The chemical tanker market softened in the second quarter, driven by typical seasonality that was exacerbated by a weak CPP environment,” said Nicolas Busch, Chief Executive Officer of Navig8 Chemical Tankers. 

 

Nicolas added, “We are nonetheless pleased with our operating results as well as the significant progress we made towards completing the financing of our newbuilding fleet. The latter is notable given the current scarcity of financing available to ship owners and reflects well upon on our business. There has been a virtual halt in new ordering of chemical tankers, and the capacity of the global fleet is forecast to rise by only 2.5 percent over the next 12 months. Against the backdrop of expanding chemical export capacity coming onstream in the U.S. and Middle East during the same time period, we expect underlying demand to outpace the supply of suitable tonnage and a favorable chemical tanker rate environment.”

 

The company has entered into contracts to acquire 37 modern, fuel-efficient newbuilding chemical tankers. As of the date of this press release, 23 of these vessels have been delivered and are in operation.

 

The remaining 14 vessels are scheduled to be fully delivered by September 2017, with five additional vessels to be delivered during the remainder of 2016, and the final nine in 2017.