Seanergy Maritime’s Stamatis Tsantanis has noted huge interest in secondhand capesize bulkers in recent weeks, and age does not seem to be a factor.
The chief executive of the US-listed owner told an earnings call: “We have seen a big inflow, a big activity of transactions the last few weeks.
“People are buying a lot of capes, and we have seen older ships — and inferior to the ones that we have been purchasing — being sold at very firm values.”
Seanergy revealed in its annual results that it had acquired a 2013-built Japanese-constructed bulker in February, just ahead of a spike in asset values.
Brokers named the ship as Sunzan Kaiun’s 181,400-dwt Kinokawa Maru, with a price tag of $33.5m after passing a special survey.
But the bulker is already worth $39m, according to VesselsValue, after a steep rise in the weeks since a deal was agreed.
“So we strongly believe, if we compare this particular acquisition with the recent precedents that we have experienced in the market, that it stands in a very, very advantageous position,” Tsantanis told the call.
“We’re very conservative in all our transactions. So overall leverage of the company, as you know, stands at around 50%.
“And in this particular transaction, we’re going to play at around, I don’t know, 50%, 60%, combined maybe with other assets or leasing transactions. We are in the process of finalising terms.”
Analysts at Fearnley Securities today described the dry bulk sale-and-purchase market as “on fire”.
Data from Clarksons suggests present deal flow is at record levels. It has tracked a total of 203 bulkers of 17m dwt reported sold in the secondhand market this year.
Twenty-seven of these have been capesizes, which is a record number of deals for such vessels during the first quarter, as Clarksons observed.
The Seanergy board has decided on a special dividend of $0.075 per share, in addition to the ordinary quarterly payout of $0.025 per share, which surprised and pleased analysts.
Shareholders to be rewarded
“As you have seen, we have done a perfectly balanced approach. We acquired ships, which we believe will contribute very significantly to the cash flow of the company going forward,” Tsantanis said.
“We also buy back the stock and at the same time, we pay a dividend. So, we’re doing all three that we can in a perfectly balanced way. It’s going to be pretty much the same.”
The CEO pledged to keep rewarding shareholders.
“But let us all be reminded that buybacks are restricted by the trading rules. I mean, there’s only so many buybacks of shares that we can do,” he told the call.
“In many cases, we have maximised that and the stock price has been increasing. So, we’re doing the best to comply with all three major balanced allocations of capital.”
