Golden Ocean inks agreements to buy Quintana Shipping's entire fleet

Apart from the 14 bulk carriers of Quintana, Golden Ocean will also purchase two ice-class panamaxes from Hemen Holding, Golden Ocean’s largest shareholder.

The vessel purchases from both Quintana and Hemen will be an all-share transaction that will see Golden Ocean issue in aggregate 17.8m consideration shares and assume debt of $285.2m.

“The acquired vessels, averaging four years of age, which matches the age profile of our existing fleet, will further enhance our already significant commercial scale and increase our operational leverage to a potential dry bulk market recovery,” said Birgitte Ringstad Vartdal, ceo of Golden Ocean.

“Combined with attractive bank financing which includes no fixed debt amortization and soft covenants through June 2019, the transaction should be accretive also in terms of cash breakeven levels.”

As part of the acquisition, Golden Ocean will acquire Quintana's 14 vessel fleet and assume the fleet's corresponding debt of $262.7m in consideration for 14.5 million shares of Golden Ocean. The 14 ships consists of six capesizes and eight kamsarmaxes/panamaxes.

Golden Ocean will also acquire two 2017-built ice-class panamax vessels from Hemen in consideration for 3.3m shares of the company, with Hemen issuing a seller credit of $22.5m that matures in June 2019.

The deal is expected to be completed during the second quarter and on a vessel-by-vessel basis. DNB Markets is acting as financial advisor to Golden Ocean.

Upon completion of this deal, Golden Ocean will control a fleet of 77 vessels and own six capesize newbuilding contracts.

Meanwhile, Golden Ocean has commenced an equity offering for issue of new shares to raise gross proceeds of approximately $60m. The offering will be directed towards certain Norwegian and international institutional investors.

Golden Ocean said it intends to use the net proceeds of the offering to partially pre-pay debt under new loan agreements in connection with the acquisition of the 14 vessels from Quintana in an amount of approximately $17.4m.