Star Bulk Carriers Corp. Q2 2010 Earnings Call Transcript

Now turning to Slide 4, we would like to provide an update of our company's recent developments. For the quarter ended June 30, 2010, we declared our fifth consecutive dividend of $0.05 as of yesterday's market close. This reflects a 7% annualized yield.

We are also pleased to announce that we have secured a $26 million loan for the Star Aurora at favorable financing cost and terms. I would like to remind our investors that we acquired the Star Aurora in February 2010 for approximately $42.5 million from a third party and chartered the vessel to Rio Tinto for about three years at a gross daily rate of $37,500.

We are especially satisfied to see our senior debt lenders demonstrate their continued support of our acquisition plans and their confidence in Star Bulk as we continue our growth strategy.

Also in early 2010, we delivered the previously Capesize vessel, Star Beta to her new owners. Last but not least, we have received $2 million as part of our claim for the vessel Star Epsilon.

Our next slide, we illustrate Star Bulk's growth overview. As you can see, in the two graphs of Slide 5, Star Bulk has managed to organically grow its original fleet of eight vessels and just under 700,000 deadweight to 13 vessels of over 1.4 million tons within four years. This means that including our current contract, our fleet growth is 111% in terms of deadweight and 63% in terms of vessels.

It is worth noting that in the process of growing our fleet, we have also been renewing it. During this period we have sold three of our older ships and bought seven younger vessels, while we have also contracted two newbuild in Capesize vessels.

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