Global Ports Investments PLC has published its interim condensed unaudited consolidated financial information and operating results for the six-month period ended 30 June 2022.
The Group’s consolidated marine container throughput declined by 22.6% year-on-year to 611 thousand TEU reflecting the market trends, Global Ports said in a statement.
Consolidated marine bulk throughput dropped by 53.5% year-on-year to 1.2 mn tons on the back of the strategic decision to cease coal handling at VSC in 2021 to drive more profitable container volume growth.
The Group’s revenue increased by 18.2% to $271.6 mn, and gross profit adjusted for impairment by 28.8% to $129.9 mn.
Adjusted EBITDA grew by 28.0% to $145.6 mn, delivering an adjusted EBITDA margin increase of 410 basis points to 53.6%.
The Group recorded a loss for the period of $400.7 mn due to an impairment of $521.1 mn. Free cash flow grew by 145.9% to $151.3 mn.
Net debt is down by $67.4 mn and net debt to LTM Adjusted EBITDA reduced to 1.5x (-0.5x compared to 31 December 2021).
‘After a strong start of the year, an increase of geopolitical tensions resulted in significant deterioration of the Russian container market conditions, including: sanctions introduced by other countries; increased volatility of financial markets and Russian Rouble; a significantly increased level of economic uncertainty; suspension of operations by container shipping lines and certain beneficial cargo owners; disruption of container supply chains and de-containerisation of export,’ the Group commented.
‘As a result, the container business of the Group in the North-West of Russia significantly reduced, while container market in the Far East of Russia remained stronger as less dependent on European container hubs and more consumer and humanitarian goods oriented’.
‘Availability of well invested multipurpose terminals in two basins allowed the Group to partially mitigate negative markets trends. That became possible due to multiple factors: the growth of non-container business in the North-West as well as due to solid unit pricing driven by growing share of higher priced Far Eastern operations, one-off significant increase of container storage time, client and cargo mix change’.
Photo: VSC