Castor Maritime has put up two bulkers as collateral for a $15m loan while it considers how to get on the right side of the Nasdaq stock exchange's minimum share-price rule.
The New York-listed owner of six panamaxes expects to obtain the credit facility next month from an undisclosed European lender.
The Greek company, which announced the deal on Wednesday but did not say how it plans to spend the loan proceeds, did not immediately return calls.
Petros Panagiotidis-led Castor also said Nasdaq has given the company another six months to 28 June to regain compliance with its $1 minimum bid price requirement.
Its shares must be worth at least $1 each for 10 consecutive days to remain compliant and listed on Nasdaq.
"The company intends to regain compliance with the minimum bid price requirement within the second compliance period, considering all available options, including a reverse stock split."
Castor has 131m outstanding shares that together make for $27.2m in market capitalisation.
The stock, which trades on the Nasdaq Capital Market under the ticker symbol CTRM, gained almost $0.04 to reach $0.21 per share by midday on Wednesday.
In November, Castor posted a third-quarter deficit of $580,153 versus a $244,229 profit a year ago, mainly due to higher costs from adding three ships.
Revenue improved 133% to $2.8m but was offset by a 200% jump in ship costs from bringing on 75,311-dwt Magic Sun (built 2001) in September 2019, 76,202-dwt Magic Moon (built 2005) in October 2019 and 73,593-dwt Magic Rainbow (built 2007) in August.
These purchases increased available fleet days to 330 days in 2020 from 118 days in 2019.
In October, Castor further expanded its fleet when it took on the 76,600-dwt Magic Horizon and 78,800-dwt Magic Nova (both built 2010) for a total of $26.6m.
