Golar LNG Profits Jump 139% in 2012

CEO Doug Arnell said new plants will keep LNG shipping strong

Golar LNG [NASDAQ:GLNG] (Golar) reports it increased its operating revenues 41 percent to $423 million in 2012, and the company said that, despite setbacks in the fourth quarter, it anticipates strong growth for liquefied natural gas (LNG) shipping in the longer term.

The company's profits rose 139 percent for the year, to $163.7 million.

Quarterly revenues were down 8 percent in the fourth quarter compared with the third, to $111.8 million, and profits fell 36 percent to $36.5 million.

The company attributed the dip in Q4 to short-term issues in the market, and to two months commercial waiting time by the Golar Maria and a scheduled dry-docking of the Golar Spirit, which reduced the company's fourth quarter Time Charter Equivalent (TCE) to $91,479 per day compared with $98,473 for the third quarter.

"Certainly, it's the case that we're entering a phase of rebalancing in the market, but we feel the long-term fundamentals are very attractive," Chief Executive Officer Doug Arnell told analysts on the company's earnings conference call.

"It's mostly due to the fact that under construction, we have over 80 million tonnes of new production coming on stream, which represents a 44% increase over current levels.

"And although the ship order book, which is fairly concentrated with deliveries later this year, 2014 and early '15, which will certainly catch the shipping up with the existing production."

The company also said it is continuing negotiations over the terms of its involvement in the Canadian Douglas Channel LNG project, after announcing in January that it planned to buy all of the plant's 700,000 metric tonnes per annum (mtpa) output when it goes online in the second quarter of 2015.

A compilation of analyst estimates in January predicted that Golar's net income will rise to $201.3 million in 2013 and $375.3 million in 2014.