Safe Bulkers Pushes All Loan Repayments to 2021
Image Courtesy: Safe BulkersDry bulk shipping company Safe Bulkers has managed to extend maturity of an existing credit facility with Nordea secured by one of its Capesize class vessels with an outstanding commitment of USD 30.3 million.
Under the deal, the maturity will be pushed by two years from June 2019 to June 2021 and the balloon payment initially scheduled to be made in 2019 will be delayed for 2021.
“This agreement concludes the refinancing of all balloon payments under all our credit and loan facilities initially scheduled prior to 2020, to subsequent years. Following this agreement, our first balloon payment will be due in 2021,” Loukas Barmparis, President of the company, said.
Safe Bulkers has been very active in talks with creditors to amend its loans and since the beginning of the year it has managed to seal five deals on refinancing.
The previous four refinancing deals saw Safe Bulkers extend the term of its existing credit facility with DNB (UK) Limited by two years to September 2022, agree a new USD 75.3 million term loan with the Royal Bank of Scotland, score a new term loan refinancing three credit facilities, worth a total of USD 44.9 million and amend a loan secured by four vessels with Unicredit, delaying the balloon payment for 2022.
