Athens' fledgling shipping bond market is gaining traction, with US-listed Capital Product Partners (CPLP) seeking to raise up to €150m ($173m) in bonds trading on the Greek stock exchange.
This will be the second maritime fixed-income security in Athens after a debut issue in May that saw containership player Costamare tap $122m through unsecured five-year bonds.
CPLP is primarily a containership company but it is selling the bonds to help expand its gas market footprint with a trio of LNG newbuildings owned by Capital Gas — the company of Evangelos Marinakis, who is a major CPLP shareholder and heads its sponsor company Capital Maritime.
According to documents filed on the Athens Stock Exchange by CPLP Shipping Holdings — the CPLP subsidiary selling the bonds — net proceeds from the sale will go towards the purchase of the 174,000-cbm vessels Attalos, Adamastos and Asklipios (all built 2021).
Secured employment
All three vessels are due for delivery by the end of the year and have secured multi-year employment deals. The Attalos is on a bareboat charter to BP Gas Marketing Limited, the Adamastos to Engie Energy Marketing and the Asklipios to Cheniere Marketing International.
Total estimated proceeds from these charters are between $333m and $621m, depending on whether charterers exercise extension options that reach, in the case of BP, up to 2034.
According to the filing, the average daily charter rate for the trio stands at $74,478 per day, excluding extension options.
Capital Gas business development director Spyros Leoussis has previously said that he expected the LNG trade to grow significantly over the next decade and play a leading role in the energy transition.
As TradeWinds reported, CPLP has an option to buy the three ships from Capital Gas for $623m. That option has to be exercised by 1 November.
CPLP plans to have completed its bond issue by then.
According to a non-binding time schedule, books for the offer are expected to be open between 18 October and 20 October.
Open to retail investors
The unsecured five-year bonds are to start trading on the Athens Stock Exchange on 25 October. The issue, which is open to retail investors, will not go ahead if lead banks Euroxx, Alpha Bank and Piraeus Bank fail to collect at least €120m.
The Costamare bond sale in May was heavily oversubscribed with demand outstripping supply by a factor of 6.7 and the annual coupon set at 2.7% — the bottom of the price range in the company's initial guidance.
Upon their purchase, the Attalos, Adamastos and Asklipios will join another three X-DF LNG sisterships, which CPLP bought from Capital Gas earlier this year for $599.5m — the 174,000-cbm Aristos 1 (built 2020) and the 174,000-cbm Aristidis 1 and Aristarchos (both built 2021).
The acquisition of these ships had marked the company’s first expansion into LNG. CPLP also owns 15 containerships and one capesize bulker.
CPLP has right of first refusal on a further trio of Capital Gas LNG carriers scheduled for delivery in 2023.
