December 02, 2008

GE Shipping net profit for Q1 2008 down by 8% YoY

It is reported that Great Eastern Shipping Company’s net profit for the Q1 ended June 30th 2008 was down 8% YoY to INR 387.59 crore against INR 421 crore for the same period in 2007, because of a negative impact of INR 138.57 crore under exceptional item as per Accounting Standard 11th

As per the report, total income of the company was up by 14% to INR 992 crore, the freight and charter hire income was higher by 10%. Average earnings from crude carrier were up by 38%, while dry bulk earnings increased by 78%. Profit booked from sales of some of the older ships was also significantly higher at INR 253.92 crore.

Eastern Shipping said that pursuant to AS 11th the gains and losses increasing from the effect of changes in the foreign exchange rates on repayments of loans and revaluation of the outstanding foreign currency loans including currency swaps relating to ships acquired from a country outside India are included under exceptional item.

Mr KM Sheth executive chairman of Great Eastern Shipping in the annual general meeting said that “The company has signed a contract to build 2 new Suezmax vessels with Hyundai Heavy Industries. These ships will be delivered in 2011. He said that with the view to focus on larger ships the company will be taking delivery of four Long Range product tankers of about 74,500 DWT each over the next 9 months. The total CAPEX of the company is about USD 779 million or INR 3,350 crore as per current exchange rates. This includes 14 building new vessels aggregating 1.17 million DWT “

Mr Sheth said that “Based on this committed expansion, the company’s fleet will be about 3.77 million DWT with an average age of 8.8 years by the end of 2011 as against a fleet of 2.85 million DWT with an average age of 10.6 years today.”