Overseas Shipholding to maintain disciplined approach to acquisitions

By Jennifer Lanning Drey

Portland, Ore., Dec. 1 - Overseas Shipholding Group Inc. will remain patient in its approach toward acquisitions, waiting for attractive deals it expects will be offered by banks in the future, chief executive officer Morten Arntzen said during a Tuesday presentation at the FBR Capital Markets Fall Investor Conference in New York.

"We don't need to be in a rush to do anything. We're going to carefully run the company. We think the economic consensus requires us to budget conservatively and continue cost vigilance," Arntzen said.

The CEO said he expects the shipping bank-loan market to get tighter in the future as banks come into their annual valuation compliance testing.

"With the shipping banking world in crisis, we must assume that liquidity remains tight and asset values remain under pressure, so we're going to continue to be careful with liquidity, and we're not going to chase acquisitions or hit the trigger early," he said.

Also during the presentation, Arntzen responded to questions related to Overseas Shipping's preferences for financing options.

Arntzen said the company will seek title-11 financing first but would look at the high-yield debt market if conditions were right,

"If we go into the market, it'll be not because we have to, but because we think the timing is good and because we think the conditions are there," he said.

Arntzen also noted that the company prefers debt financing rather than equity.

Overseas Shipholding is a New York-based tanker company.

© 2015 Prospect News.
All content on this website is protected by copyright law in the U.S. and elsewhere. For the use of the person downloading only.
Redistribution and copying are prohibited by law without written permission in advance from Prospect News.
Redistribution or copying includes e-mailing, printing multiple copies or any other form of reproduction.