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Top Tankers to Return to Equity Markets?

Top Tankers recently received shareholder support to double its authorized common stock from 50-100 million shares. CEO Evangelos Pistiolis asked for the raise in shares to give the company more flexibility in order to support future acquisitions. Currently, Top has roughly 27 million outstanding shares.  This comes after the company’s $147 million IPO last summer, $148 million follow-on offering and withdrawn $300 million convertible offering. These offerings allowed Top to expand to a fleet of 23 vessels, made up of suezmax tankers and product carriers (they expanded so fast, in fact, that we even lost track of their NAV for a couple weeks). Mr. Pistiolis and his management have certainly demonstrated that they are both determined and highly energetic.
Written by: | Categories: Freshly Minted, The Week in Review | July 7th, 2005 | Add a Comment

Natasha Boyden Initiates Top Tankers with STRONG BUY

Cantor Fitzgerald Analyst Natasha Boyden, in a recent report, provides important and interesting information regarding Top Tankers, INC (TOPT). As a review, headquartered in Athens, Greece, TOPT transports crude oil and refined petroleum products on its fleet of 23 tankers, comprised of nine suezmaxes and fourteen handymaxes.
Ms. Boyden comments on TOPT’s “balanced charter strategy” which allows the company to manage a constant flow of revenue. Of the nine suezmaxes, three operate under time charter contracts with profit sharing arrangements and one trades under a straight time charter contract. The fourteen handymaxes are all set up under long-term time charters with profit-sharing arrangements. These, of course, help insulate the company from any dramatic fall in tanker spot rates in the future.
To ease the burden of the present high oil prices, OPEC is increasing production by 500,000 barrels per day (bpd). Because tanker spot rates depend on the supply of oil as opposed to the actual price, it is predicted that the spot rate environment will remain above the average level for the next twelve months.  In addition to the increase made by OPEC, global demand for oil and economic development in China should positively affect the spot rates. The current orderbook for tankers, which as of March 2005 included 85 million dwt, “is more than sufficient to meet projected oil demand growth…” according to Ms. Boyden, though the concern for tanker investors is probably the other way around.
Ms. Boyden believes that TOPT is in a favorable position for continuous growth. During the first quarter of 2005, TOPT’s long-term debt-to-total resource ratio was roughly 50%. It is predicted that TOPT’s long-tem debt-to-total resource ratio will rise slightly to 51% towards the end of 2005 as a result of recent vessel purchases. However, this increase should not raise concern as the ratio is still in concordance with peer long-term debt-to-total capital average of 50%. Ms. Boyden estimates that TOPT will post free cash flow (net operating cash minus capital expenditure minus dividend) in 2005 of $76 million, or $2.72 per share, and in 2006 of $70 million, or $2.52 per share.
Along with her colleagues, Ms. Boyden believes TOPT’s stock is undervalued. As we go to press, TOPT’s share price stands at $15.87 per share. In addition to it’s strong charter The company is in an ideal position to benefit from increases in the spot rate environment and due to its time charter contracts enjoys a steady flow of visible revenue. Ms. Boyden gives TOPT a STRONG BUY rating with a price target of $23 a share.

Written by: | Categories: Freshly Minted, Market Commentary | June 30th, 2005 | Add a Comment

Top Finally Gives up on Convertible Offering

After nearly a month in the market, a change of underwriters and several changes to pricing, Top Tankers officially withdrew its $300 million convertible preferred stock deal this week citing market conditions. Proceeds of the offering were to be used to acquire the 15-vessel bulk carrier fleet of Greek owner AM Nomikos, and the deal has since been called off as a result of the failed offering.
No matter what you think of the company or the deal, one thing is for sure – both Top and its advisors clearly worked tirelessly to make this deal happen.
So what happened? Like most unfortunate outcomes, the inability of Top to conclude its deal resulted from a combination of factors that are both specific to the deal and general to the markets. First off, there was the shipping market. Although most investors and analysts we speak to agree that the drop in dry cargo freight rates is little more than a temporary blip, Top’s plan to acquire a fleet of dry cargo ships was not ideally timed to say the least – especially as charter rates have declined while ship values have remained the same or even firmed for some vessel classes.
The second factor that went against the deal regarded the underlying market for convertible securities. As some readers may know, the convertible market has tipped in favor of issuers in recent years, with transactions for companies like OMI and Seacor pricing at thin yields of 2.75% and lofty conversion strike prices of about 45%. This imbalance of supply and demand for convertible products has resulted from the growing number of hedge funds that use the structure to create “riskless” returns. For those who aren’t familiar with this form of black box investing, the way it works is that funds go long the convert and short an equal quantity of the stock so that they are effectively insulated from any change in the underlying stock price. In this scenario, funds earn their return by collecting the coupon on the debt and often leveraging their capital to enhance that yield. Issuers like the market because it either very cheap debt (if the stock doesn’t reach its conversion price) that is non-dilutive or fully priced equity (if the stock does convert).
Although Top had already been marketing the deal for a couple of weeks, the hedge fund community was stunned when GM and Ford’s debt fell in value when it was downgraded to junk status at the same time the company’s stock rose thanks to a Dutch auction bid from Kirk Kerkorian. What this meant was that hedge funds that were long the bonds and short the stock, a logical hedge strategy for a deteriorating credit, were punished when the company’s equity value rose as its debt sank. The losses incurred from the unusual scenario forced many funds onto the sidelines just as Top was trying to price.
The structure itself may have presented another challenge. When the deal was initially brought to market, we understand the yield was 5.75%. Although this is a relatively high yield, one challenge may have been that Top itself pays a dividend of about 5%. This means that the difference between what investors would have to pay on the stock they are short and what they would earn on the convertible was pretty small. In response to market push back, sources tell us that Top improved the economics to 6.75% with a conversion price up 20%, but perhaps by that time the market had gotten too choppy.
Another potentially problematic issue may have been the size. As we go to press, Top Tankers has a $450 million market cap, and it was in the market for a $300 million convertible in a market that generally sees convertibles that are around 25% of the issuing company’s size.
Nothing Ventured, Nothing Gained
Although we imagine that the company, its advisors and AM Nomikos are disappointed with the outcome, shareholders are none the worse. According to a statement made by the company, Top will not forfeit any deposits that may have been lodged when the MOA was signed, and the so the only major cost here was that of opportunity.
President and CEO Evangelos Pistiolis stated, “We carefully considered the possible acquisition in light of various financing alternatives available in the market, but concluded that proceeding with the acquisition of this fleet would not be in the best interests of our shareholders at this time.” Reading between the lines, Pistiolis probably feels that the net asset value of the company’s stock is in excess of its current $16 share price – something that should give investors comfort at current levels.
Written by: | Categories: Freshly Minted, The Week in Review | May 26th, 2005 | Add a Comment

Nasdaq Dominates New Shipping Issues Market

According to public filings, it appears that seven of the nine upcoming shipping issues will be listed on the Nasdaq, joining the recent IPOs of Top Tankers and DryShips. It seems like Times Square is the place to be these days.
Written by: | Categories: Equity, Freshly Minted | May 19th, 2005 | Add a Comment

Quintana – Wall Street Mining Wall Street

A few weeks ago, we wrote an article in these pages called “Eagle Bulk – All About the Arbitrage.” The article outlined the recently filed S-1 for an IPO of handymax bulk carriers being offered by New York private equity fund Kelso. In this article, we discussed the concept of private equity funds buying ships just prior to, or even concurrent with, IPOs so that they could capture the arbitrage that exists between the value of ships in the private and public markets.
Although much of this premium has been drained away during the last six weeks due to choppiness in both the equity markets and the shipping markets, we believe it is likely to return in the very near future and look for shares back in the range of 1.5x net asset value. The transaction concept is one with which private equity funds are comfortable: buy a company cheap, then sell enough of it to the public to get their money out with a return through a dividend, and then keep a slug of shares in the company that has the potential to result in a real home run.
With the economics of the shipping markets fitting this bill, the concept is spreading, and we are seeing more and more non-shipping company issuers in the shipping markets. The way to think of this is that Wall Street wants products and is willing to pay a certain price for them, and in response a variety of experienced financiers are creating these products and attempting to bring them to market. There is nothing necessarily wrong with this; in fact companies created for the sole purpose of equity offering might offer cleaner management structures and fewer conflicts of interest than old-line companies.
This week, we saw the filing of an IPO called Quintana Maritime, which is backed by Corby Robertson, whose family sold the Quintana oil field in Texas to Exxon many years ago, and who has since made investments in commodities such as coal mining. Robertson has teamed up with First Reserve of Greenwich (who have been plotting an entry into shipping ever since their agreement to purchase OMI shares at about $1.50 each a few years ago failed amidst bad feelings) and American Metals & Coal International, also of Greenwich. Stamatis Molaris, former CFO of Stelmar, is serving as CEO and President of Quintana. Citigroup and Morgan Stanley, who lent the company the money it needed to acquire its fleet, are acting as joint bookrunning managers.
A Short History
Quintana does not have the storied history that many recent and future issuers have. They cannot point to hundreds of years of experience or their origins from an island – except perhaps Long Island. In fact, they were formed on January 13th, 2005, and began operations in the following April, in other words last month. As of March 31, 2005, Quintana had not taken delivery of any of the identified panamax vessels, though the company did take delivery of three such vessels in April, and expects to take two more in May and the remaining three in July, August and September.
Distinguishing Deals
One of the challenges borne of the incredible torrent of deals heading to market is differentiation. What we mean is that there is nothing particularly compelling about this deal compared to others currently or soon to be trading in terms of asset type, employment, age, deal size, management or structure. Like Eagle Bulk, Quintana has signed MOAs and placed deposits on the eight modern panamax bulkers outlined in Figure 1.
Although we expect valuations to improve, the company shows strong asset and structural similarity to Diana Shipping, which suffered from bad timing in both the shipping and equity markets that may have been exacerbated by the fact that it was fully priced and sold into the wrong types of accounts. This must be a little unnerving for the sponsors, and we fail to understand how this deal will ever be judged on anything other than how much of discount it is offered at relative to Diana. Although Quintana does not indicate that it will use the model of a dry cargo version of Nordic American Tankers as Diana did, the company does plan to repay its debt in full upon consummation of the offering.
Perhaps there will be enough buyers to go around. There is nothing inherently wrong with the Quintana deal, but the sponsors will need to see valuations improve and have one heck of a good roadshow. That said, with the firepower of Citigroup and Morgan Stanley behind them, who likely do lots of other business with the sponsors of this deal, it is unlikely that it will be sold into the accounts of hedge fund “flippers” as the Diana deal seems to have been.
Of Bridge Loans and Mezzanine
As we also wrote in our article about Eagle Bulk, these kinds of deals are not without risk to the sponsors as we cruise along a high point in the cycle. In fact, they involve a lot of risk. Unlike the Top Tankers IPO, in which the purchase of the Sovcomflot fleet was contingent upon a successful equity offering, both Eagle and Quintana involve the sponsors buying ships first and hoping they can get a premium in the future. In this case, the joint bookrunners have provided both secured debt and mezzanine facilities to result in 85% financing. This structure is not dissimilar in concept to the highly leveraged facility that Citigroup and Nordea provided to soon-to-be-public Genco, sponsored by yet another private equity firm, Oak Tree Capital.
Quintana entered into a $150 million bridge loan facility, dated as of May 3, 2005, with Morgan Stanley Senior Funding, Inc., not a regular player in the world of ship finance. In addition, the company entered into a new six-year three-month $262 million secured delayed-draw term loan facility, dated as of April 29, 2005, with Citigroup. The term loan facility consists of Tranche A, in an aggregate amount equal to the lesser of $213 million and an amount equal to 65% of the fair market value of the vessels, and a Tranche B, in an aggregate amount equal to the lesser of $49,210,500 and 15% of the fair market value of the vessels. The aggregate principal amount applied in respect of any vessel acquisition must not exceed 80% of the fair market value of the vessel. According to the filing, interest on amounts drawn will be payable at a rate of 1.625% per annum over LIBOR in respect of Tranche A and 2.50% over LIBOR in respect of Tranche B, for interest periods of 1, 2, 3 or 6 months or, if agreed by all lenders with commitments, 9 or 12 months. In the event the Tranche B term loans are not syndicated within 45 days, Tranches A and B will collapse into a single tranche and interest will be payable at a rate of 1.75% per annum over LIBOR.
Written by: | Categories: Uncategorized | May 5th, 2005 | Add a Comment

Early Earnings Solid, Led by the Newly Public

The first round of 2005 earnings has come in, and the results are solid overall. While tanker companies General Maritime and Teekay did not see revenues quite as strong as 1Q04, the results were certainly nothing at which to balk. OMI, International Shipholding and Kirby all posted increases across the board, with OMI’s results particularly strong, and consistent in the revenue, net income and EBITDA categories, as shown in the accompanying table. The real over-performers so far, not surprisingly, were the companies who have gone public and expanded their fleets substantially in the past year. DryShips saw revenue, net income and EBITDA all increase by more than 70% based on 1Q04, while Top Tankers saw returns more than quintuple in each of these three categories.

Written by: | Categories: Freshly Minted, The Week in Review | April 28th, 2005 | Add a Comment

Top Tankers in $300 Million Convertible

The highly acquisitive, and therefore capital-hungry, Top Tankers announced last night that it intends to privately place up to $300 million aggregate principal amount of Series A Cumulative Convertible Preferred Stock, convertible into shares of the company’s common stock. Top also plans to grant to the initial purchaser of the convertible preferred stock an option to purchase up to an additional $45 million aggregate principal amount of preferred shares. Top’s “house” investment bank Cantor Fitzgerald has been mandated on the deal.

Use of Proceeds – Ships and Delta Hedge

The company intends to use $250 million of the proceeds to fund vessel acquisitions, including the $475 million acquisition of the Nomikos fleet and another $95 million to acquire two double-hulled tankers.

Top will also use $50 million of the proceeds to buy common stock while Kingdom Holdings, which owns about 15% of the company’s shares and is controlled by members of the Pistiolis family, has agreed to purchase another $20 million of the common stock.

This total of $70 million will likely be acquired by the purchaser of the convertible preferred securities, who would then short the stock to create a “Delta Hedge.” This is not unlike what OMI did when it used a corporate share repurchase program to facilitate its recent convertible bond issued through Jefferies.

Although shares held by Evangelos Pistiolis, through an entity called Sovereign Holdings, are locked up until July 18, 2005, the lock-up for shares held by Kingdom Holdings expired on January 19, 2005.

DVB Joins Royal Bank of Scotland

In addition to the proceeds of this deal, in March 2005 Top entered into a credit facility with DVB Bank, for a total of $56.5 million, to finance the purchase of two suezmax tankers, the M/T Stopless and the M/T Stainless. The loan is payable in 28 varying quarterly installments, beginning on July 29, 2005, and a balloon payment of $10.2 million, payable together with the last installment. The interest rate on the DVB credit facility is 125 basis points over LIBOR. Beginning on the date of the credit facility and ending on the final drawdown date, Top will pay the lender a quarterly fee of 0.25% of the average undrawn amount of the loan for the quarter.

Why They Did It

So why did Top Tankers move into the world of financial exotica rather than simply issuing another round of common stock? There are several reasons. For one thing, the continued issuance of equity used for dilutive acquisitions ultimately erodes shareholder value and therefore is not popular among holders, though we do not intend to suggest that this is the case here. Although investors can understand that sometimes a premium must be paid for certain transformational transactions, they don’t like to see it done over and over. That’s why we thought Top would turn to the highly attractive high yield bond market to finance the Nomikos acquisition.

Pricing

The dividend rate and conversion rate are to be determined by negotiations between Top and the initial purchaser of the convertible preferred stock. These deals are generally executed very quickly, often on an overnight basis, so look for pricing details shortly. Although these have not yet been announced, the table showing last year’s convertible issuance that accompanies this article should give you an idea of what to expect. In an industry like shipping, it is typical to see a deal priced with a 7% dividend convertible at a premium of around 25% – known in Wall Street parlance as a “7 Up 25”. Another rule of thumb is that the conversion premium should be about 3.5x the coupon.

The Valuation – 110% NAV and 4.3x EBITDA

As for the valuation of the Top acquisitions, they appear to be very attractive. Nomikos has agreed to sell its fleet of vessels for $475 million and then lease them back for 24 months at an aggregate charter rate of $357,000 per day – $24,000 per ship per day. Using an average operating cost of $4,000, Top will generate about $110 million of cash flow per annum on the vessels, creating a purchase price of 4.3x EBITDA. Nomikos has also agreed to provide credit support for the charter hire. Based on our valuation of the fleet, Top is paying just 3.5x 24 months of contracted cash flows and only a slight premium over current NAV for the vessels on a charterfree basis.


Written by: | Categories: Freshly Minted, The Week in Review | April 28th, 2005 | Add a Comment

Quintana – Wall Street Mining Wall Street

A few weeks ago, we wrote an article in these pages called “Eagle Bulk – All About the Arbitrage.” The article outlined the recently filed S-1 for an IPO of handymax bulk carriers being offered by New York private equity fund Kelso. In this article, we discussed the concept of private equity funds buying ships just prior to, or even concurrent with, IPOs so that they could capture the arbitrage that exists between the value of ships in the private and public markets.
Although much of this premium has been drained away during the last six weeks due to choppiness in both the equity markets and the shipping markets, we believe it is likely to return in the very near future and look for shares back in the range of 1.5x net asset value. The transaction concept is one with which private equity funds are comfortable: buy a company cheap, then sell enough of it to the public to get their money out with a return through a dividend, and then keep a slug of shares in the company that has the potential to result in a real home run.
With the economics of the shipping markets fitting this bill, the concept is spreading, and we are seeing more and more non-shipping company issuers in the shipping markets. The way to think of this is that Wall Street wants products and is willing to pay a certain price for them, and in response a variety of experienced financiers are creating these products and attempting to bring them to market. There is nothing necessarily wrong with this; in fact companies created for the sole purpose of equity offering might offer cleaner management structures and fewer conflicts of interest than old-line companies.
This week, we saw the filing of an IPO called Quintana Maritime, which is backed by Corby Robertson, whose family sold the Quintana oil field in Texas to Exxon many years ago, and who has since made investments in commodities such as coal mining. Robertson has teamed up with First Reserve of Greenwich (who have been plotting an entry into shipping ever since their agreement to purchase OMI shares at about $1.50 each a few years ago failed amidst bad feelings) and American Metals & Coal International, also of Greenwich. Stamatis Molaris, former CFO of Stelmar, is serving as CEO and President of Quintana. Citigroup and Morgan Stanley, who lent the company the money it needed to acquire its fleet, are acting as joint bookrunning managers.
A Short History
Quintana does not have the storied history that many recent and future issuers have. They cannot point to hundreds of years of experience or their origins from an island – except perhaps Long Island. In fact, they were formed on January 13th, 2005, and began operations in the following April, in other words last month. As of March 31, 2005, Quintana had not taken delivery of any of the identified panamax vessels, though the company did take delivery of three such vessels in April, and expects to take two more in May and the remaining three in July, August and September.
Distinguishing Deals
One of the challenges borne of the incredible torrent of deals heading to market is differentiation. What we mean is that there is nothing particularly compelling about this deal compared to others currently or soon to be trading in terms of asset type, employment, age, deal size, management or structure. Like Eagle Bulk, Quintana has signed MOAs and placed deposits on the eight modern panamax bulkers outlined in Figure 1.
Although we expect valuations to improve, the company shows strong asset and structural similarity to Diana Shipping, which suffered from bad timing in both the shipping and equity markets that may have been exacerbated by the fact that it was fully priced and sold into the wrong types of accounts. This must be a little unnerving for the sponsors, and we fail to understand how this deal will ever be judged on anything other than how much of discount it is offered at relative to Diana. Although Quintana does not indicate that it will use the model of a dry cargo version of Nordic American Tankers as Diana did, the company does plan to repay its debt in full upon consummation of the offering.
Perhaps there will be enough buyers to go around. There is nothing inherently wrong with the Quintana deal, but the sponsors will need to see valuations improve and have one heck of a good roadshow. That said, with the firepower of Citigroup and Morgan Stanley behind them, who likely do lots of other business with the sponsors of this deal, it is unlikely that it will be sold into the accounts of hedge fund “flippers” as the Diana deal seems to have been.
Of Bridge Loans and Mezzanine
As we also wrote in our article about Eagle Bulk, these kinds of deals are not without risk to the sponsors as we cruise along a high point in the cycle. In fact, they involve a lot of risk. Unlike the Top Tankers IPO, in which the purchase of the Sovcomflot fleet was contingent upon a successful equity offering, both Eagle and Quintana involve the sponsors buying ships first and hoping they can get a premium in the future. In this case, the joint bookrunners have provided both secured debt and mezzanine facilities to result in 85% financing. This structure is not dissimilar in concept to the highly leveraged facility that Citigroup and Nordea provided to soon-to-be-public Genco, sponsored by yet another private equity firm, Oak Tree Capital.
Quintana entered into a $150 million bridge loan facility, dated as of May 3, 2005, with Morgan Stanley Senior Funding, Inc., not a regular player in the world of ship finance. In addition, the company entered into a new six-year three-month $262 million secured delayed-draw term loan facility, dated as of April 29, 2005, with Citigroup. The term loan facility consists of Tranche A, in an aggregate amount equal to the lesser of $213 million and an amount equal to 65% of the fair market value of the vessels, and a Tranche B, in an aggregate amount equal to the lesser of $49,210,500 and 15% of the fair market value of the vessels. The aggregate principal amount applied in respect of any vessel acquisition must not exceed 80% of the fair market value of the vessel. According to the filing, interest on amounts drawn will be payable at a rate of 1.625% per annum over LIBOR in respect of Tranche A and 2.50% over LIBOR in respect of Tranche B, for interest periods of 1, 2, 3 or 6 months or, if agreed by all lenders with commitments, 9 or 12 months. In the event the Tranche B term loans are not syndicated within 45 days, Tranches A and B will collapse into a single tranche and interest will be payable at a rate of 1.75% per annum over LIBOR.

Written by: | Categories: Equity, Freshly Minted | April 5th, 2005 | Add a Comment

Top Reported to be Acquiring Nomikos

Although still in the rumor stage, Top Tankers was reported in the trade press as having struck a deal to acquire AM Nomikos. If true, the deal is yet further evidence of accelerating consolidation in 2005. With shipyards full, companies cash rich, debt and equity abundant and public companies trading at a premium to net asset value, we continue to believe that en bloc deals will dominate in 2005.
Written by: | Categories: Freshly Minted, The Week in Review | March 31st, 2005 | Add a Comment

Top Acquires Nomikos – A Watershed Event

For many years, Marine Money conferences have featured presentations asserting the theory that when public markets begin to value shipping companies at a premium to net asset value, the entire ownership structure of the industry will change. The change, it was said, would be inevitable because public companies would have a lower cost of capital and could therefore be more competitive on the single largest daily expense item – money.
After years of theorizing, this fundamental change appears to be underway. Although the larger and more established public companies such as Teekay and OSG have seen this situation for some time, we believe the emergence and aggressiveness of Top Tankers has really been the catalyst for a change of psychology in Greece – the change in psychology is that there are only three options: to be public, to sell to a public company, or to slowly liquidate assets. Although figures vary since foreign companies are able to make confidential filings for IPOs, we understand there are about 15 deals in registration, comments and drafting currently.
One of the most startling examples of the change that is taking place is the ”broker talk” this week that Top Tankers has reached a deal to acquire AM Nomikos. Top has been an aggressive buyer since going public last July, but to date has picked up unwanted vessels such as the older ships owned by Sovkomflot and suezmaxes that Essar had been marketing for some time.
But the acquisition of Nomikos, if it is true, is something else entirely; the idea that a company like Top, which at this time last year was a private company with very few ships, can acquire the entire fleet of a company like Nomikos, a multi-generational blue chip shipping company with a premier fleet and reputation that was never even for sale, has been a real eye opener. We imagine that Top presented Nomikos with an offer the company simply couldn’t refuse, about $50 million over already high asset prices from our rough and dirty calculations.
If, as we mentioned above, sensible private shipping companies have three options, going public, selling to a public company or slowly liquidating, Nomikos chose option number two. In an effort to understand why this deal appears to have been consummated, we thought we’d do some math.
As you can see from the fleet list and valuation, the Nomikos ships are worth about $415 million. Using full employment, current spot rate estimates, the company would generate $174 million in cashflow in the current 12-month period. Using public comparables, if Nomikos had decided to go public, their fleet could have been valued at about 4x cash flow, or almost $700 million. The major difference, of course, is that when a company goes public, the selling shareholders generally extract a healthy valuation and keep control of the company and management of the vessels, which generally employs family members.
However, if the deal ever comes to fruition, judging from the valuation of Nomikos, it offers them a chance to get a full valuation from their fleet without taking the risk of doing a public offering. The IPO is a consuming process that can take as few as four months but much longer if there are accounting issues. Pre-funding expenses can be about $1.5 million, so if the equity market and/or the shipping markets do not cooperate, the entire effort can be made in vain.

Written by: | Categories: Freshly Minted, Mergers & Acquisitions | March 31st, 2005 | Add a Comment
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