Excel Maritime Carriers Ltd.(fka EXMCQ)

[m177]

EXM Reports Q2 (Jun) loss of $0.41 per share, excluding non-recurring items, $0.02 worse than the Capital IQ Consensus Estimate of ($0.39); revenues fell 31.4% year/year to $63.1 mln vs the $56.03 mln consensus. As of August 24, 2012, we have secured contract coverage for 100% of the available days of our Capesize vessels and 82% of the available days of our Kamsarmax/Panamax vessels for the current year ending December 31, 2012. With respect to the entire fleet, 83% of the available days of 2012 have been fixed, 21% of which are under contracts which offer an upside potential through profit sharing arrangements or index-linked structures and hedge against downside price risk through floor protection. "In the face of challenging conditions we are continuing our strategy of cost containment and disciplined chartering policies. Excel has taken proactive steps to address the weak market environment since the beginning of the year, first by agreeing with our lenders to defer installments and waive covenants on our existing credit facilities and more recently raising incremental capital to strengthen our balance sheet. Our industry is trying to cope with excess tonnage and increased uncertainty in the global economy. Unfortunately, so far we have not seen any significant increase in scrapping which would help moderate the pressure from vessel deliveries, leading to a challenging near term outlook for the markets that we service. We continue to believe a significant increase in vessel scrapping and restraint in vessel ordering would lead to a faster recovery in freight rates in the future.''