Asia/Pacific News
Aegean Reduces Singapore Headcount by 15, Barges by Two
Aegean Marine Petroleum Network Inc. [NYSE: ANW] (Aegean) today said during 2Q 2017 in Singapore it reduced its headcount by 15 and moved two barges to cold lay-up.
"Both vessels are under negotiation to be chartered out to third-party contractors," Aegean President Jonathan Mcilroy said during today's earnings call, adding that the staff were "linked mainly to vessel operations and back-office functions."
The move comes as part of wider steps the supplier is taking to reduce costs and better utilize its assets.
"I would like to highlight an important note that Aegean Marine Petroleum is still a physical supplier in Singapore with a supplier's license that is fully compliant with the MPA. We have simply changed the model we work through using barging contracts for deliveries as opposed to our own vessels," said Mcilroy.
Mcilroy said Aegean has also laid up vessels in a number of other markets including Fujairah, where the fleet has been reduced to two vessels, and two other vessels have been placed in hot lay-up with auctions for their deployment under time charter to third-party operators.
"Looking at wider fleet deployment, six vessels were placed out on profitable time charters with third-party operators worldwide. Another six vessels are in various states of lay-up with four of those vessels at advanced stages of negotiation for profitable mid to long-term time charter employment at the close of the quarter,"
"We are also implementing an ongoing rationalization of the fleet deployment to secure better utilisation of the operated barges in a number of core markets such as Gibraltar."
As reported by Ship & Bunker yesterday, Aegean saw bunker sales volumes rise by 9% year-on-year in Q2 to 4,474,494 metric tonnes, but net income for the period fell 87.4% year-on-year to $1.7 million.
