Gram Car Carriers has agreed a five-year charter with Zim Integrated Shipping Services for a mid-sized pure car/truck carrier (PCTC) in a deal worth $55.8m.
The Oslo-listed car carrier owner said the 4,200-teu Viking Sea (built 2011) would earn an average day rate of $30,612 over the charter period.
Zim already has the vessel on a 12-month time charter until October 2022 at $25,500 per day and this new charter will extend that employment to the fourth quarter of 2027.
The rate is slightly above Fearnley Securities expectations of $30,000.
The investment bank calculates Ebitda of $34m from the deal, assuming 10% weighted average cost of capital and operating expenses of $6,000 per day.
“Overall, the contract further points to a continued strong market and outlook in the car carrier space, where limited supply and increasing electric vehicle production and exports [is] backing increasing charter levels and durations,” Fearnleys said.
The investment bank believes the segment “still has some legs” and continues to highlight GCC, which has four panamax ships coming open for charter in 2023.
GCC chief executive Georg A Whist said this latest charter “confirms the favourable market fundamentals and supports our long-term earnings visibility”.
Oslo-listed GCC said it has 3%, 45% and 70% revenue days open for 2022, 2023 and 2024, respectively, following this latest contract.
This is the second long-term charter GCC has secured in little more than a month for one of its PCTCs.
At the end of May the company sealed a six-year charter for the 5,000-ceu Viking Passama (built 2012) to New Zealand’s Armacup, a subsidiary of the Wallenius Wilhelmsen Group.
The vessel has secured a charter rate of $33,000 per day and will generate a total contract value of approximately $72.9m up to the end of its charter in late 2028.
The ship’s current charter is expiring in the fourth quarter of 2022 at $17,000 per day.
GCC is the world’s third-largest tonnage provider within the PCTC segment with 18 vessels, across the distribution, mid-size and panamax segments.
The shipowner is shortly to see four modern 6,700-ceu PCTCs roll off current contracts in late 2022 and early 2023.
“They are currently on contracts in the $16-18,000 per day range and we should expect a multiple of this on the new contracts,” Fearnleys Securities said in a recent research note.
