Hoegh Autoliners exercises option to purchase Hoegh St. Petersburg
Today, Hoegh Autoliners ASA through its subsidiary, Hoegh Autoliners Shipping AS, declared an option pursuant to a certain bareboat charterparty to purchase the vessel Höegh St. Petersburg for a purchase price of USD 29.3 million from Pioneer Leasing, a company controlled by Credit Agricole Corporate and Investment Bank (CA-CIB), according to the company's release.
The average market value of the vessel estimated by three different brokers was USD 70 million by the end of Q3. The purchase of the vessel is fully financed at attractive terms. Hoegh St. Petersburg was built by Höegh at Daewoo Shipbuilding & Engineering in 2009 with a capacity of 7,850 CEU and is one of a series of vessels Hoegh built at Daewoo between 2004 and 2010. The vessel was sold to Pioneer Leasing in 2014 and chartered back to Hoegh Autoliners under a bareboat lease agreement.
The ownership of the vessel will be transferred to the Company in Q4 and she will continue to serve in Hoegh Autoliners deep sea network. This is the third bareboat chartered vessel the Company has declared options to purchase so far in 2022 (Hoegh Beijing and Hoegh Tracer are the two others). The purchase of H. St. Petersburg will reduce the long-term cash capacity cost for the vessel as well as realise additional value gains from purchase options for leased vessels.
Hoegh Autoliners is a leading global provider of RoRo (Roll On Roll Off) transportation services delivering cars, high and heavy, and breakbulk cargoes across the world. The company operates around 40 RoRo vessels in global trade systems and makes about 3 000 port calls each year.
