Dry bulk operator Safe Bulkers reported record profitability on Wednesday, amid soaring freight rates that have allowed the company to kill several birds with one stone.

The US-listed operator has cut its debt load by a third over the past five quarters to $414m as of the end of September, according to its latest set of financial results.

"As we move to year-end, we are gradually nearing our targeted leverage," Safe Bulkers president Loukas Barmparis said in a press release, in which the company announced a record quarterly profit of $55.4m for the three months through to September, up from just $3.3m in the same period of 2020.

Results were equally rosy for the first nine months of the year, in which Safe Bulkers piled up $109.1m in profit, reversing a loss of $20.5m in the corresponding year-ago period.

The surge in profitability is underpinned by robust freight markets, which boosted the company’s time charter equivalent rate for a third consecutive quarter to $24,427 per day.

These positive factors far outweighed additional costs incurred to cope with Covid-19. The pandemic boosted Safe Bulkers’ crew and related expenses by $900,000 in the third quarter.

Benign market conditions and a prescient move to start ordering newbuildings last year have allowed the company to pursue other objectives alongside debt reduction.

Chinese out, Japanese in

Barmparis said "significant progress" was made on the fleet-renewal front, with eight kamsarmaxes and post-panamax newbuildings ordered in Japan and four Japanese-built ships acquired on the secondhand market.

At the same time, Safe Bulkers sold seven ships of similar sizes that were older than the ones acquired, or were built in China.

It remains to be seen whether the improved earnings situation will allow the company to start paying dividends to shareholders as well.

In the third quarter, Safe Bulkers stuck to its established policy of not distributing one.

In other share-related moves, the company sold $10m worth of its stock in the third quarter under an ongoing "at-the-market" equity offering programme that allows share sales worth up to $100m.

Safe Bulkers has sold shares worth $71.5m under that programme since August last year.