Singapore Shipping Corp

[learner88]

The towkay feels no need to keep the shareholders informed. Learning from the acquisition of Capricornus Leader, I searched around and hey look what's on the website.

Source: http://www.singaporeshipping.com.sg/corp...ofile.html

Our milestones
2014
- Acquired M/V Capricornus Leader, a pure car truck carrier, with capacity for 5,415 cars.
- Acquired M/V Centaurus Leader, a pure car truck carrier, with capacity for 5,427 cars.
- Signed a MOA for a new pure car truck carrier, with capacity of 7,000 cars to be delivered Mar 2015

The capacity figure is like a yo-yo that goes up and down depending on which source you look at.

We should be able to reverse engineer out some numbers for Capricornus Leader based on the 3Q results which will be released in Feb 2015.

[learner88]

It's here as well.

http://www.singaporeshipping.com.sg/ship-owning.html

Vessel Capacity Built
Boheme 7,200 cars 1999
Sirius Leader 5,190 cars 2011
Cougar Ace 5,540 cars 1993
Capricornus Leader 5,415 cars 2004
Centaurus Leader 5,427 cars 2004
New Build 7,000 cars Delivery in Mar 2015

[Boon]

It's here as well.

http://www.singaporeshipping.com.sg/ship-owning.html

Vessel Capacity Built
Boheme 7,200 cars 1999
Sirius Leader 5,190 cars 2011
Cougar Ace 5,540 cars 1993
Capricornus Leader 5,415 cars 2004
Centaurus Leader 5,427 cars 2004
New Build 7,000 cars Delivery in Mar 2015

Sirius - presumably owned by 100% subsidiary company: SSC Sirius Leader Pte. Ltd – was paid in cash.

Boheme - presumably owned by 100% subsidiary company: SSC Boheme Pte. Ltd - has been mortgaged as security to secure bank borrowing

Capricornus – owned by Ow Brothers Pte. Ltd. - was paid entirely in cash
https://www.classnk.or.jp/register/regsh...mo=9283863

There was only USD 3.197 million cash left as at 31-Sept-2014.

With Centaurus now delivered and the expected delivery of the new vessel in March 2015 - unless Sirius, Capricornus & Boheme are mortgaged/re-mortgaged to secure more borrowing as I have previously outlined - it looks like these two purchases (USD 96.5 million worth), especially the new vessel, would almost entirely be funded with debt - with LTV ratio probably exceeding 95%.

USD 80 million for a new 7,000 cars capacity vessel looks expensive to me - considering that Ocean Yield ordered 2 x 8500 cars vessels to be delivered in 2016 for USD 137 million - may be that's the trade-off for near 100% leverage - hire purchase with zero or little up front payment - pure speculation on my part - ha-ha !

As a common practice, the new ship would likely be strucured to be owned by a one-ship subsidiary company of SSC- whether there will be any sister-ship-mortgage involved in the financing remains to be seen.

For the new vessel: Purchase price looks high, financing cost is still an unknown - all in, it still could be a good deal if the chartered rate is high - have to wait and see.

(vested)

[Drizzt]

they are cheaper perhaps because they are built in china.

[ahyu02]

Timing of the delivery seems like a factor to me. Hope can get better charter rate.

[greengiraffe]

Being a asset suppliers to Oligopolistic car carrier principals, chartered rates are likely to be negotiated based on an acceptable rate of returns over a long period of time.

Given that SSC recently sold an old RORO vessel at the end of the chartered and useful life (if no wrong to be at 30 years old) for a small gain is indicative of the close relationships within this segment of the shipping industry.

CK Ow quit the volatile end of the shipping industry before the GFC and kept his powder dry till the recent 2 years. I think he must his own rationale to be so bullish on this segment of the industry - very likely a highly stable one with very decent rates of returns over a long period of time.

At his age, it will take a lot more for he to become an "Incredible Hulk" to subject his own wealth at risks unless he is so certain on what he has stepped up to embark...

Incidentally, when share price climbs higher, the interests of VB on SSC also rises... maybe SSC is just at the beginning of a new Uptrend, not too far from bottoms. Contrast it to Boustead, a favourite in 2011 - 13, there are no longer active discussions despite Boustead continue to trade near record levels.

GG

Timing of the delivery seems like a factor to me. Hope can get better charter rate.

[Nick]

http://infopub.sgx.com/FileOpen/_eFORM1V...eID=327077

Mr Ow added 102,000 shares @ $0.270 / share to raise his stake to 161.0 million shares or 36.9% stake.

(Vested)

[valuebuddies]

S$27k is probably just little tiny peanuts for Mr. Ow, more likely just to boast minorities' confidence despite the bad economy sentiment, eventhough has not caused much impact on SSC.

[brattzz]

show of confidence!

buy-buy-buy!

[greengiraffe]

Dun play play... Snr Ow on his new voyage surely must be confident especially when he is also gearing to the tilts.

Anyway, he seldom play with fire and moreover 102k accounted for the bulk of 115k done on 2 Dec 14.

I better go look in my closet to see if I can find anymore $ to follow the man.

Vested
Minor Core
GG