Eckerö Group – Year-end Report for 2019

+2.9% passengers (€3.5 million)

+2.0% revenue (€238.6 million)

Operating profit, adjusted for sales gains, EUR 1.0 million (EUR 15.6 million)

Operating profit, including sales gains, EUR 1.0 million (EUR 16.3 million)

Profit for the financial period EUR 0.8 million (EUR 10.2 million)

Interest-bearing liabilities EUR 95.1 million (EUR 71.8 million)

Net debt of EUR 56.3 million (EUR 18.2 million)

Cash flow from business operations EUR 16.4 million (EUR 28.6 million)

In May, the group invested in a ro-pax vessel which was renamed FINBO CARGO. The ship was deployed on the Helsinki-Tallinn line at the end of June. During Q1 of 2020, FINBO CARGO will be docked to be upgraded to ice class 1A.

TRANSPORTER was purchased in the spring and put in April in traffic with DFDS as carrier.

The main reasons for the decrease in earnings are the dockings, deterioration in earnings in Birka Cruises, the weak krona as well as start-up of FINBO CARGO and strike effects.

Viking Line sent out this message: “As a result of the coronavirus (COVID-19), operating conditions in our markets have deteriorated significantly. It is still too soon to quantify the impact on results since there is great uncertainty regarding developments. Therefore, our earlier business performance outlook no longer applies.”

Jan Hanses, President and CEO

The bonds of Naviera Armas, owner of Transmediterranean, collapsed to almost half their value after Moody´s and Standard & Poor´s have reduced their solvency.

Anek Lines’s cruise ferry EL. VENIZELOS is being chartered by Turkish Miray Cruise International. For 35 days she will be used as a floating hotel at the shipyard in Cadiz.

The large ferry sailed to Cesme on the evening of 7 March 2020 in order to load the necessary supplies as well as special personnel.

On 9 March she departed for Cadiz  where she is expected to arrive on 14 March.

On 10 March, Stena Line’s ropax STENA SUPERFAST X arrived at Perama (Greece) –from Belfast– in order to undergo a small-scale conversion and interior remodelling for her new career.

The ship is on long-term charter by Corsica Linea. From summer 2020 she will be introduced on the North African service (Marseille-Algeria).

Renamed A. NEPITA, she will fly the Cypriot flag.

158 extra cabins will be added.

She is also going to get scrubbers, probably in Malta.

STENA EDDA, the biggest ferry ever to sail on the Belfast to Liverpool route, embarked on its maiden voyage on Monday 9 March as it left Merseyside amid a host of celebrations which included a spectacular countdown lightshow.

With 40% more deck capacity, 40% more cabins and 30% more fuel efficiency than current vessels on the route, STENA EDDA accommodates up to 1,000 passengers, 120 cars in its dedicated garage deck and 3,100 lane metres of freight.