New York-listed Teekay Tankers, which boosted its position as the mid-size tanker bellwether after the Princimar deal, recorded an adjusted gain of $41.3m in the three months to the end of June.
With increased spot exposure in a better market and a larger fleet following the addition of five ships in January, the owner was able to turn around a $4.1m loss seen at this stage a year ago.
Earnings per share of $0.35 were four cents below what analysts had expected.
Kevin Mackay, chief executive of Teekay Tankers, said: "Our second quarter results benefited from the prevailing counter-seasonally strong crude spot tanker rates during the quarter.
"We believe the ongoing strength in the tanker market reflects the continuing positive tanker market fundamentals of low fleet growth, growing global oil demand and an increase in long-haul tanker movements as more crude oil moves from the Atlantic to Pacific basins."
"Record high crude oil supply from OPEC and continued crude oil stockpiling as a result of the lower oil price environment have provided further support to the crude tanker market during the second quarter and into the third quarter to-date."
However, there was no indication of how the company will adjust its dividend following the Princimar deal and the $45.5m purchased of ship-to-ship transfer business, SPT Inc from parent Teekay Corp and Skaugen.
The deal with Apollo backed Princimar, announced yesterday, solidifies Teekay Tanker’s position as mid-size tanker bellwether by bringing its market capitalisation above $1bn, Magnus Fyhr of GMP says.
While Teekay Tankers made no mention of a revised dividend policy, Mike Webber of Wells Fargo expects the owner to adopt a distributable cash flow (DCF) metric, similar to sister companies Teekay Offshore and Teekay LNG.
“We would expect it to be orderly and conservative, but mostly likely significant, with any potential change likely coming in late 2015 after the vessels have delivered (probably late in the third quarter or early in the fourth) upon closing,” he said.
