New York-listed Scorpio Tankers ran to a heavy loss in the first quarter but has seen better rates on this quarter's bookings across all operating classes.
The world's largest product tanker owner on Friday reported an adjusted loss of $57.3m, or $1.05 per share, which was in line with the $1.04 deficit projected by Wall Street analysts.
The results reversed a profit of $46.6m, or $0.85 per share, in the same period of 2020. Time charter equivalent (TCE) revenue dropped to $133m from $250m.
The company's bottom-line loss for the first quarter came in at $62.4m, reversing a $46.6m profit in the first three months of last year.
Stifel analyst Ben Nolan said in a client note that the results were slightly better than his expectations, "although that big loss still reflects the extremely challenging tanker market environment".
However, Monaco and New York-headquartered Scorpio has built its cash liquidity to some $280m through a series of refinancing deals, most of which have been previously announced or previewed last quarter.
They included a range of sale-and-leaseback arrangements, exchange of convertible notes and debt refinancing transactions.
Scorpio is highlighting an improved rates environment in the current quarter.
With a little under half of operating days booked, Scorpio reported TCE rates of $14,700 per day on its LR2s so far in the second quarter.
That compares to $11,980 per day in the first quarter.
The company's LR1 tankers have earned $13,700 per day in the current period, up from $11,292 in the first three months of the year.
And second quarter TCE rates came in at $13,000 per day, up from $11,326 per day in the prior reporting period.
Finally, Scorpio said its handymax tankers have seen $11,900 per day this quarter, an improvement on $9,065 from the corresponding quarter last year.
The company has maintained its regular quarterly dividend of $0.10 per share.
Emanuele Lauro-led Scorpio said its results had been hit by the continued impact of Covid-19 on operations and oil demand.
"Recently, the easing of restrictive measures and successful roll-out of vaccines in certain countries have begun to stimulate oil demand and have manifested into sequential improvements in market conditions to start the second quarter of 2021," Scorpio said.
The Monaco and New York-based company owns, lease-finances or bareboat charters 131 product tankers, made up of 42 LR2s, 12 LR1s, 63 MRs and 14 handymaxes, with an average age of 5.3 years.
