SFL - Earnings Call - Q1 2025

Transcript

Espen Nilsen Gjøsund (VP of Investor Relations)

Of investor relations in SFL. Our CEO, Ole Hjertaker, will start the call with an overview of the first quarter highlights, and then our Chief Operating Officer, Trym Sjølie, will comment on vessel performance matters, followed by our CFO, Aksel Olesen, who will take us through the financials. The conference call will be concluded by opening up for questions, and I will explain the procedure to do so prior to the Q&A session. Before we begin our presentation, I would like to note that this conference call will contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Words such as expects, anticipates, intends, estimates, or similar expressions are intended to identify these forward-looking statements. Please note that forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance.

These statements are based on our current plans and expectations and are inherently subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause future activities and results of operations to be materially different from those set forth in the forward-looking statements. Important factors that could cause actual results to differ include, but are not limited to, conditions in the shipping, offshore, and credit markets. You should therefore not place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements. Please refer to our filings within the Securities and Exchange Commission for a more detailed discussion of risks and uncertainties, which may have a direct bearing on operating results and our financial condition. I will leave the word over to our CEO, Ole Hjertaker, with highlights for the first quarter.

Ole Hjertaker (CEO)

Thank you, Espen. We are now announcing our 85th dividend and continue building our business as a maritime infrastructure company with a diversified fleet. We reported revenues of $193 million this quarter, and the EBITDA equivalent cash flow in the quarter was $116 million. Over the last 12 months, the EBITDA equivalent has been $545 million. The first quarter's result was impacted by several one-off items, including impairments on some older dry bulk vessels traded in the spot market and also the drilling at Hercules being idle in the quarter. We therefore recorded a net loss in the quarter of $32 million or $0.24 per share. With a dividend of $0.27 per share, we have returned more than $2.8 billion to our shareholders over 85 consecutive quarters, and the latest dividend represents a yield of approximately 13% based on share price yesterday.

We have also been active repurchasing shares in the recent market softness and have bought back $10 million worth of shares below $8 per share over the last few weeks. This is based on our overall capital allocation strategy with the aim to maximize long-term distribution capacity per share. The seven dry bulk vessels between 57,000 and 82,000 deadweight tons were previously on long-term charters and have thereafter been employed in the spot market. The vessels are built in China between 2009 and 2012, and we have not been able to find new long-term charters for these vessels due to a combination of age, design, and fuel efficiency. The recent market volatility and recession fears after the recently implemented tariffs make it even more difficult to trade the vessels profitable in the spot market, and we have now sold one of the vessels and agreed to sell another.

While the impairments are $34 million in aggregate, the actual cash-on-cash returns from the investments in these vessels have actually been quite decent and in the 12%-15% range on a levered basis for two of the Supramax bulkers we have agreed to sell. The reason is that the vessels were on high charters initially, but according to U.S. GAAP, we have had to amortize the vessels on a straight-line basis from new. For other assets like the container ships and car carriers, the charter fee values were around $1 billion higher than carrying costs at quarter end, so we have a significant buffer there. The drilling rig Hercules has been idle since the fourth quarter of 2024, and the recent market turmoil and oil price volatility have delayed new employment opportunities for the rig, which is impacting our near-term financial results.

We remain optimistic about finding new employment for the rig and continue to explore strategic opportunities for the rigs in parallel, but it is difficult to give any guiding on timing for this. The rest of the portfolio on long-term charters is performing very well, and we have upgraded several vessels in the quarter, boosting both cargo intake and fuel efficiency in connection with charter extensions at higher rates than before. Our charter backlog is currently $4.2 billion, and importantly, more than 2/3 of this is to customers with investment-grade rating, giving us a unique cash flow visibility and resilience in light of the current market volatility. We have a strong liquidity position, including an underwritten portion on credit lines and also multiple unlevered vessels, which should enable us to continue investing in new accretive assets.

With that, I will leave the word over to our Chief Operating Officer, Trym Sjølie.

Trym Sjølie (COO)

Thank you, Ole. Our current fleet is made up of 79 maritime assets, including vessels, rigs, and contracted newbuildings. In April, we sold the Supramax SFL Yukon, and in May, we will be selling the last of our two old 1,700 TEU container ships, the Asian Ace. She is scheduled to be delivered to buyers later this week. Another Supramax is also in the process of being sold. As previously reported, Golden Ocean, the charterer for our eight capesize bulk carriers, has declared their purchase option, and we expect the vessels to be delivered to Golden Ocean in July. Our backlog from owned and managed shipping assets stands at $4.2 billion, and the fleet in Q1 was made up of 15 dry bulk vessels, 38 container ships, 16 large tankers, two chemical tankers, seven car carriers, and two drilling rigs.

We have a diversified fleet of assets chartered out to first-class customers on mostly long-term charters, and the majority of our customer base is large industrial end users. Container vessels dominate our backlog, accounting for about 67% of our portfolio. Key to remain an attractive partner is to ramp up investments in fleet renewal, new technology, and vessel upgrades, which we are doing. Stricter regulatory demands, particularly from the IMO and the EU, aimed at cutting shipping emissions, is another driving factor. By enhancing our fleet, we position ourselves for organic growth, either by supplying new vessels to clients or extending the life of existing ones. Container operators, in particular, are receptive to collaborative projects involving major upgrades like cargo capacity increases, energy-saving technologies, propeller enhancements, and hull modifications. These investments deliver significant cost savings and emissions reductions, benefiting both our operations and our clients.

In Q1, 95% of charter revenues from all assets came from time-chartered contracts and only 5% from bareboats or dry leases. The charter revenue from our fleet was about $193 million in the quarter. We had a total of almost 6,600 operating days, defined as calendar days, less technical or fire and dry dockings or stacking. Six vessels have been in dry docking in the quarter, including major upgrade projects. It's worth mentioning that the time at the shipyard required for these container ship upgrades, beyond the 15 days required for a normal dry docking, is for charterers' account. Our overall utilization across the shipping fleet in Q1 was 98.6%. Adjusted for unscheduled technical or fire only, the utilization of the shipping fleet was 99.8%, a testament to a high quality of our vessel management.

When including the drilling rigs, utilization was 97.2%, mainly due to the Hercules rig being idle in the quarter. The Trump administration's recent imposition of fees on Chinese-built and operated ships has garnered significant attention lately. These fees originate from a 2024 Section 301 investigation under the Biden administration, which scrutinized China's dominance in global shipbuilding, maritime, and logistics industries. Initially proposed in February 2025 by the U.S. Trade Representative, the fees target Chinese-built and Chinese-owned vessels docking at U.S. ports in an effort to bolster U.S. shipbuilding and reduce dependence on China's maritime infrastructure. For SFL, the relevant provisions are Annex 2, covering Chinese-built vessels, and Annex 3, addressing foreign-built car carriers, a new addition not part of the original February proposal. This effectively applies to nearly all non-U.S. flagged vehicle carriers.

Of our 79 vessel fleet, approximately 27 will be affected by these fees, in our estimation, primarily car carriers and tankers, with potential impacts on larger container ships later, depending on our fleet composition going forward. However, since our vessels are on long-term charters, these fees will be passed on to charterers. We are currently investigating the practical implementation of these fees, particularly the payment processes, which we are discussing with our charterers. On the energy side, the Linus rig earned $20.3 million in Q1, more or less flat from Q4, with three days of downtime in the quarter. Due to good performance, the rig was recognized as ConocoPhillips' rig of the month for all three months in the quarter. OpEx was $12.2 million in Q1, slightly down from Q4. Subsequent to quarter end, the market index rate of Linus has been adjusted up by 2% from May 1st.

The Hercules rig is currently warm-stacked in Norway and being marketed for opportunities later in 2025 and 2026. During the first quarter, the rig recorded $2 million in revenue relating to equipment rental income. The majority of this equipment has been returned to SFL subsequent to quarter end, and we do not expect to receive further rental income. Rig OpEx was approximately $6 million in the quarter, reflecting warm-stacking costs of the rig. I will now give the word over to our CFO, Aksel Olesen, who will take us through the financial highlights of the quarter.

Aksel Olesen (CFO)

Thank you, Trym. On this slide, we are shown a perform illustration of cash flows for the first quarter. Please note that this is only a guideline to assess the company's performance and is not in accordance with U.S. GAAP and also a net of extraordinary and non-cash items. The company generated gross charter hire of approximately $193 million during the first quarter, with approximately $85 million coming from our container fleet, including approximately $1.7 million in profit share related to fuel savings on seven of our large container vessels. As in the previous quarter, revenue was impacted by scheduled dry dockings and efficiency upgrades on some of our large container vessels.

The car carrier fleet generated approximately $25 million of gross charter hire in this quarter, including profit share from fuel savings, which is slightly down from the previous quarter, as one vessel underwent a scheduled dry docking during the quarter. Our tanker fleet generated approximately $43 million in gross charter hire, slightly up from the previous quarter, as all five tanker vessels acquired in 2024 had their first full quarter of revenue. As well as 15 dry bulk vessels, of which eight are employed on long-term charters. The vessels generated approximately $18 million in gross charter hire in the first quarter. The seven vessels employed in the spot and short-term market contributed with approximately $4.4 million in net charter revenue, compared to approximately $7.2 million in the fourth quarter. SFL owns two harsh environment drilling rigs, the large stacked rig Linus and the ultra-deepwater semi-submersible rig Hercules.

Ole Hjertaker (CEO)

The rigs generated approximately $22.4 million of charter hire in the quarter. Our operating and G&A expenses for the quarter was approximately $78 million, down from approximately $104 million in the fourth quarter, as operating expenses on the Hercules is reduced in the current warm-stacking mode compared to in full operating mode when the rig is on contract. Going forward, we estimate operating expenses of approximately $80,000 per day for the Hercules in the current warm-stacking mode, excluding potential upgrades. This summarizes to an adjusted EBITDA of approximately $116 million compared to $132 million in the previous quarter. We then move on to the profit and loss statement as reported on the U.S. GAAP. For the first quarter, report total operating revenues are approximately $187 million compared to approximately $229 million in the previous quarter.

The contribution from our vessels was approximately $171 million compared to approximately $177 million in the previous quarter, while the rigs contributed with approximately $22.4 million, down from approximately $54.9 million in the previous quarter, as Hercules was idle in the first quarter. Vessel operating expenses in the quarter was approximately $58 million, including $10 million related to scheduled dry dockings, compared to approximately $64 million in the previous quarter, including $14 million related to scheduled dry dockings. Dry dock expenses for ships are being expensed when incurred, and the vessels are out of service during the dry dock period, reducing revenues temporarily. The net result in the first quarter was also impacted by non-recurring or non-cash items, including vessel impairments of $34.1 million relating to seven non-core dry bulk vessels trading in the spot market.

Overall, and according to U.S. GAAP, the company reported a net loss of approximately $31.9 million or $0.24 per share, compared to a net profit of approximately $20.2 million or $0.15 per share in the previous quarter. Moving on to the balance sheet. At quarter end, SFL had approximately $174 million of cash and cash equivalents, in addition to undrawn credit lines in the amount of approximately $48 million. In addition, the company had unencumbered assets with a market value of approximately $187 million at quarter end. The company has conducted share repurchases of approximately $10 million, and approximately 40% of this had been acquired by quarter end. During the quarter, the company repaid debt facilities in the amount of approximately $47 million, in addition to ordinary loan installments of approximately $65 million.

We also had vessel upgrades related to some of the large container vessels of approximately $20 million during the quarter, most of which will be reimbursed through charter rate increases. We furthermore had remaining capital expenditure of about $850 million remaining on five large container vessels expected to be funded through pre-imposed delivery funding. Those vessels are expected to be delivered in 2028. Based on the Q1 numbers, the company had a book-to-equity ratio of approximately 26%. To conclude, the board has declared the 85th consecutive cash dividend. With a dividend of $0.27 per share, we have returned more than $2.8 billion to our shareholders over the years. We also have been active repurchasing shares in the recent market softness as part of our overall capital allocation strategy, with the aim to maximize long-term distribution capacity per share.

Our charter backlog is currently $4.2 billion, and importantly, more than 2/3 of this is to customers with investment-grade rating, giving us a unique cash flow visibility and resilience in the light of the current market volatility. Furthermore, our strong balance sheet and liquidity position provide us flexibility in the current market environment and enable us to pursue new investment opportunities. With that, I give the word back to the operator who will open the line for questions.

Espen Nilsen Gjøsund (VP of Investor Relations)

Thank you, Aksel. We will now open for a Q&A session. For those of you who are following this presentation through Zoom, please use the raise hand function under Reactions in the toolbar to ask a question. When your name is called out, please unmute your speaker and ask your question. Thank you.

We will have our first question from Gregory Lewis. Greg, please unmute your speaker to ask your question.

Gregory Lewis (Managing Director)

Yes, thank you and good afternoon, everybody, and thanks for taking my questions. I was hoping for a little bit more color on kind of vessel and rig operating expenses. I mean, clearly that was a nice step down sequentially. I'm assuming that's a little bit around maybe some cost savings at the Hercules. You did mention some dry dockings. I'm kind of curious as we look out over the rest of the year, Q2, Q3, Q4, and any kind of color around planned out-of-service days around dry dockings. In the event that we were able to, or when we do get work on, eventually get work on the Hercules, how should we think about the rescaling of OpEx related to that rig?

Trym Sjølie (COO)

Trym Sjølie here. I think relating to your question on dry dockings and OpEx, this year is a very busy dry docking year. I think we're looking at, I mean, some dates can move, but up to sort of 17 vessels, which if you just straight line it, sort of an average year would be 10. It is more than usual. We had a heavy dry dock schedule in Q1, and Q2 will also be more than usual, and then it will taper off in Q3 and Q4 and into next year. The brunt of the sort of dry dock-related costs are sort of taken in Q1 and Q2 this year. I'll leave it to Ole to give some color on the Hercules. That's a little bit of a different issue. I think, was that clear enough on the dry docking question, or would you?

Gregory Lewis (Managing Director)

No, that's super helpful.

Trym Sjølie (COO)

Okay. Thank you.

Maybe Ole on the Hercules.

Ole Hjertaker (CEO)

You know, we have both rigs incurring OpEx. Linus, the regular OpEx, has been working, has had a very high utilization through the charter, has been rig of the month, every month during the first charter quarter, which is with ConocoPhillips, which is very good. The Hercules remains stacked in Norway, awaiting new contract opportunities. I mean, we are discussing opportunities, but we cannot be specific on that. We will report that when we have concluded something. While the rig is there, we are keeping it warm-stacked, which means that there is a run rate cost for the rig. It is in the region of around $80,000 per day to keep a rig like that warm, so it is ready to go out on very short notice. We are also doing some upgrades on the rig to ensure that it is a very attractive rig in the market.

In light of the recent market volatility and oil price volatility, we've seen that all companies, and this is both onshore and offshore, are a little careful with their investments. Therefore, we've seen several oil companies guiding that their CapEx is adjusted downwards given the uncertainty. At the same time, that specific rig is one of relatively few rigs with capabilities of drilling in harsh environment during winter. We do believe there will be good demand for the rig down the road, but we cannot be specific on exactly when. Yeah.

Gregory Lewis (Managing Director)

Yes, super helpful. Just following up on that, if I were to think, just if I pick a date for the rig to go to work, is it kind of safe to, I mean, we're spending money to keep the rig hot, active, ready to go. Is it safe to just assume that in the quarter leading up before putting that rig back to work, maybe there's a couple million dollar impact to OpEx or something even?

Aksel Olesen (CFO)

Yes, so Greg, Aksel here. Absolutely correct. I would assume in the quarter before it goes on the contract, it is more like run rate contract as per on a normal contract. There is a step up in that period. Yeah.

Trym Sjølie (COO)

You basically have to put more people on the rig and have to prepare. You typically earn the charter rate when the rig starts drilling. In the weeks ahead of that, you have always a ramp up of OpEx up to run rate levels. That's just a normal part of that.

Ole Hjertaker (CEO)

Yeah, that's why we get the mobilization cost effectively, right?

Gregory Lewis (Managing Director)

Yeah, yeah, perfect. Okay. Clearly, there's a lot of uncertainty out there around, I guess, there's multiple issues happening. I guess what I wonder is, just given the business model of redeploying capital on accretive deals, what is kind of, I guess, in terms of asset sale opportunities, and I mean, or I should say asset acquisition opportunities for SFL, how has that changed over the last few months? Really, what has been the appetite for customers to actually look to charter in tonnage longer term just because for SFL, you need to be able to get your hands on the asset, and then you also need to be able to contract the asset. Just kind of curious how that's kind of evolved over the last few months. Yeah, I'll stop there.

Ole Hjertaker (CEO)

Yeah. I think there was a distinct difference between, what was it, February, early March, and what was it going into April with all the noise around the tariffs and port fees and whatnot. Our sense is that particularly in April, everyone in the market were a little hesitant because nobody could see, had visibility on what was actually going to happen in the various segments. It was basically across the board. Higher uncertainty means that decision processes take longer. At the same time, the customers then, if you look at our core fleet and where our strategy is, which is long-term charters to very strong industrial players, as you know, we have like 2/3 of our backlog to investment-grade companies. These are not companies that sort of live or die on the spot market rate.

These are companies who have a more longer-term logistics mindset and therefore aren't necessarily so dependent on the short-term market. We see already now that, what was it, discussions we had earlier in the year where that sort of went a little slowed down for a period is now picking up again. We think that with some more stability and predictability around world trade and tariffs in particular, we hope that will lead to more business, call it executable business transaction. Also, alongside with that, you had a very hot year last year and the year before on the new building side where shipyards, what was it, kept rising their prices. With a little lower activity, maybe you can also see some softening on price expectation, which also comes nicely together with investment opportunities.

We have quite decent capital available, both as cash, we have undrawn facilities, and also some assets available. I think importantly, we have built up a standing over more than 20 years now as a very reliable, call it, customer for funding institutions, banks, particularly in Asia. We are very active in the Japanese market, for instance. With long-term predictability, we are there, we always perform, which means that we think we have pretty good access to capital for new projects now. That is at least based on our interaction. As always, we will never guide on how much we will do in any specific quarter beforehand. We report deals as we do them. Historically, as you have seen, some quarters we are very active, other quarters we are not.

It's all about trying to do the right deals and not just do it on a program basis to get the right deals.

Gregory Lewis (Managing Director)

Super helpful. Thanks very much, gentlemen.

Espen Nilsen Gjøsund (VP of Investor Relations)

Yes, thank you. All right, we will take our next question from, and sorry if I'm mispronouncing your name, Clement Milla. Please unmute your speaker to ask your question.

Hi, good afternoon. Thank you for taking my questions. I wanted to start by following up on Greg's question on the Hercules. You've been clear it's difficult to provide any guidance regarding when the asset will come back. Could you talk a bit more on the upgrades you're conducting and your expected cost?

Ole Hjertaker (CEO)

I'm sorry, upgrades to the Hercules specifically, you mean?

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. What we're doing, as we speak, when the rig is idle or hot-stacked like now, for instance, we are doing some work on the flooring, which is effectively part of the claim with Seadrill where we were awarded, call it, money from Seadrill. That's one of the items there, that the flooring in the living quarters there was not maintained as it should, and therefore needs to be redone. That is very difficult to do when the rig is working because then you have to shut down sections of the living quarters. That is something that we're doing now. We're talking a couple of hundred thousand dollars expense to do that. That is something that we hopefully, when the Seadrill court case is finalized in the end, that's part of money we will be effectively compensated for.

We're also upgrading the drilling control system to the state-of-the-art controls, fully automated systems, which is something you typically need in the harshest of environments when the rig is working. The cost level for that is $7 million-$8 million. We're also replacing some electrical systems at the same time to make sure that it's more reliable, which are also expenses that will come, some of them later in the year, with a couple of million dollars. We are active on the rig. We are making sure that it's very attractive for all companies to use and make sure that it's a safe and warm asset.

These are assets that if you put a rig in what they call cold-stack, i.e., you leave it there and with minimal manning, if any, and do not keep running the equipment and maintaining it, it takes relatively short time until it becomes very expensive to reactivate the rig. We believe that it is better value for us to do these, call it, investments, including keeping the warm-stack costs, which will then hopefully enable us to find work for the rig. We have to remember that this rig is a legacy asset in SFL. We were never supposed to own and operate, or call it, never supposed to operate the rig. Seadrill, back in the day, they had a purchase obligation. There was really a financing structure. After two rounds of Chapter 11s in Seadrill, we ended up taking it back.

We were awarded around $48 million by a court after we sued them for, call it, lack of maintenance. That has been appealed. That case is coming up next year. We believe we have a very strong case as supported by the first round. We have not recorded anything in our accounts. We have expensed legal fees along the way and have nothing in our accounts as, call it, value for that potential final court award when that comes up. If we look at the other assets we have in our portfolio, which is really our core assets, there we control the maintenance ourselves. We can do all the preventive maintenance we need to do and therefore have a very different dynamics in terms of what it costs to keep these vessels as we go with customers like Maersk, Hapag-Lloyd, Volkswagen, K-Line, and others.

That's very helpful. Thank you. Actually, I also wanted to ask about the $35 million in remaining CapEx you mentioned, which is attributable to efficiency upgrades on the container ships. How should we think about the cadence for those?

Trym Sjølie (COO)

As in when they will, I mean.

Yeah, exactly. When will you incur into the expense?

I think most of the costs remaining, which is for the container ships, it's around, I have to check, but it's around $18 million at the moment for the upgrades, and they will be incurred in Q2 and Q3.

Thanks for the point.

They will be on these vessels, particularly that we are talking about, they will be 100% covered by a rate increase on the charter. It also includes the off-hire that we incur due to the longer dock duration over and above a normal dry docking of about 15 days.

Makes sense. Thank you. Final question from me. The board decided to maintain the dividend despite the Hercules remaining open. Could you provide an update on how you view the, let's say, long-term distribution potential, and how do you balance that with share repurchases?

Ole Hjertaker (CEO)

Yes. The dividend is set on a quarterly basis. We never provide any guiding on the dividend as a matter of principle and never have. The dividend typically, or I would say the mindset behind the dividend is a long-term sustainable level based on cash flow, net cash flow produced by the assets we own. The comment relating to Hercules here and the employment was really in the context of a prolonged layoff and therefore associated costs and no revenues for that rig for the long run. We felt that it was appropriate to mention that depending on how long that will take, that will have an impact on the cash flow to the company and therefore eventually also the distribution capacity that we have. If you look at capital allocation, it is a combination of investments, debt issuance, debt repayments, share buyback, and dividends.

That is really how that is allocated between those is really a question of maximizing long-term distribution per share and effectively overseen by the board. Like the share buyback we did, it's around $10 million. I mean, if you look at the dividend now, it's more than $30. It's not a huge proportion relative to the dividend. The board felt that it was a very attractive level. It was below $8 on average. We also bought back some shares in 2023. That is part of that toolbox that the company has to maximize returns over time. It could be any combination of these elements.

Thanks for the call. And thank you for taking my questions.

Thank you.

Espen Nilsen Gjøsund (VP of Investor Relations)

All right. Before we go to Mr. Baldoni, I see we've gotten some questions in here via text. I guess the first question is, are container vessels still the preferred segment for building the contract backlog going forward?

Ole Hjertaker (CEO)

Yeah. We look at many segments in parallel. We have a diversified, call it, market approach in the maritime space. We look at, we have looked at container ships. We have done a few car carriers in the past. We're looking at tankers. We're looking at chemical carriers. We've also looked at the gas carriers recently. I cannot guide specifically on that. What is important here for us is high-end assets, modern high-end assets to very strong counterparties where we can have a real value for them in their value chain. The reason why we have built up a number of ships in the container ship segment is that we can do just that. We have very strong operational performance and can combine that with access to attractive financing structures and can therefore be competitive for these companies and add on in their value proposition.

Part of the value proposition is to run the ship as efficiently as possible. Part of the investments that Trym mentioned on the container ships are investments that are making, call it, moving boxes more efficient. We calculate on these vessels around 20% efficiency improvement, which is a combination of both hull modifications, maybe new propeller, the increasing cargo intake, and all of that are bringing down the effective fuel cost per box, which is creating a better value for a liner company or in other segments that could be an energy company if you look at the tankers. This is something we always work on. We cannot guide on specific segment allocation.

Espen Nilsen Gjøsund (VP of Investor Relations)

Thank you, Ole. Another one here. Given your backlog to diversified majority investment-grade counterparties and the fact that you've become an energy infrastructure company now, can you work to decrease your debt interest costs, in particular your credit spreads over SOFR? Your recent refinanced debt still has a rather large credit spread versus your diversified long-term backlog and strong cash/balance sheet.

Aksel Olesen (CFO)

Sure. Thank you for that. Yeah, I think if you look historically in terms of where we have the margins we obtain in the market, I think at least in the six years I've been here, it's been coming in quite significantly, especially over the last 12 months-24 months in terms of what we're achieving in both the conventional, call it, commercial bank market, but also when doing Japanese operating leases. Things almost enterprised very competitively, at least on the asset-backed financing that we're achieving. Also in terms of, call it, profiles, covenants, etc., that we have and also the partly guaranteed we do on most of these facilities. Yeah.

Espen Nilsen Gjøsund (VP of Investor Relations)

Thanks, Aksel. And then we'll go to CJ Baldoni. Please unmute your speaker to ask your question.

CJ Baldoni (Senior High Yield Analyst)

Hi, good morning. Can you hear me okay?

Ole Hjertaker (CEO)

Hi.

CJ Baldoni (Senior High Yield Analyst)

Okay. Sorry, another question on the Hercules. How long can it remain warm-stacked?

Ole Hjertaker (CEO)

With the stacking, call it, methodology or the stacking plan we have on that rig, that can remain stacked for quite some time without causing a problem. Part of what we've done, for instance, in the stacking now is that we are doing work that will effectively delay the next SPS or dry dock, call it, position on the key equipment on board the rig. That is also a reflection of the capital or the stacking costs that we are spending on the rig to ensure that it is remarkable. If we had dropped that, of course, you could drop it down significantly, but you are running into a situation where you may have to replace a lot of equipment on the rig to bring it back out working. You would need a much longer contract at high levels to justify that.

I would say for now, we can keep it like that for several quarters. Of course, we look at that continuously. From our perspective, it's always a question of investing capital versus getting capital back. It's something that we spend quite a bit of time on since it's a costly asset and the stacking costs are relatively high.

CJ Baldoni (Senior High Yield Analyst)

Yeah, understood. I just, for some reason, thought that maybe there was a time limit, so to speak, where I understand there's a lot of different factors involved. I suspect that you wouldn't be spending the money if you didn't think that there were opportunities to recontract it.

Ole Hjertaker (CEO)

You're absolutely right. What we have seen in the past, we've seen companies who have dropped, call it, who have sort of what we call cold-stacked rigs. Then you're talking a matter of months before it's almost not remarkable. Because what we have to remember is that a drilling rig is a very different, call it, concept really than a ship. A ship, that's basically where you carry cargo on the ship. A drilling rig is really just the platform or whatever where you put all the drilling equipment. For an oil company who are extremely focused on safety and performance and operational issues, they would be very careful of taking in a rig where the system hasn't been maintained and run properly. We are working together with Odfjell Drilling here. They are the manager for us on the Hercules.

The rig has had a very strong performance, first for Exxon in Canada, then for Galp in Namibia, then back for Equinor in Canada. They pride themselves in having very high-end standards, which is, of course, also helping us in the marketing of the rig with oil majors because they know that, okay, this rig has been kept at the highest standards. This rig is being effectively maintained and systems are run, which means that there is a lower risk of taking the rig out compared to something that's been mothballed for a long period.

CJ Baldoni (Senior High Yield Analyst)

Right, right. I also suspect there's multiple solutions to this. Some of them might involve some creativity to kind of insulate the broader company as a whole. I can leave it at that, but thanks. You mentioned the new build spend. I mean, most of the remaining $800 million-odd is going to need to be placed closer to delivery, or are there still more payments to be made?

Aksel Olesen (CFO)

No. Yeah, I think the remaining, I mean, so far we paid approximately $150 million last year. Then you have some additional pre-delivery installments starting 12 months before each ship is delivered. Starting in Q1 2027, we are in discussions with various banks and financial institutions in terms of fully funding with a combination of, call it, pre-delivery and then post-delivery financing. Yeah.

CJ Baldoni (Senior High Yield Analyst)

Okay. Could you elaborate maybe on the Annex 2 and 3, 27 vessels impacted? How many of those are impacted if they trade to the United States? Can you just elaborate on that?

Ole Hjertaker (CEO)

I mean, in our fleet, we have 38 now Chinese-built vessels. And then we have the car carriers that are not for them are Chinese-built and three of them are, sorry, five Chinese-built and two not. But all the car carriers are sort of, and when we say impacted, we mean that they would be impacted by calling the U.S. And some of the vessels are exempt, like they can be Chinese-built but below a certain size, like small container ships or below 4,000 TEU and bulkers below a certain size. But when we look at the numbers and based on the way that our ships trade, we see that right now the most affected sectors are car carriers and tankers in the SFL fleet. Our container ships are not really impacted because they're either not built in China, which is most of them, or they are smaller.

If you just give you some idea of what we are talking about for us, if you look at SFL's trading pattern last year and our U.S. calls, we would incur about $26 million in port fees given the 2025 sort of fee schedule if you sort of impose them on what we did last year. We believe that our charters will probably change their trading pattern slightly due to this. We do not see much change for the car carriers, actually, because it applies to all car carriers. The only thing that can reduce that number is less trade to the U.S. in general. We do not expect that, though. It is important to say that we look at this as charter's costs.

The only thing that, and the thing that we are sort of looking at is how the fees will be handled in practice, i.e., who has to pay them. Is it part of the clearance of the vessel into the port, or how is it actually going to work? It's too early to say. We are working with our charters to find out exactly how it's going to be handled in practice.

CJ Baldoni (Senior High Yield Analyst)

Okay. Great. Thank you for that. I appreciate it. That's all I have.

Espen Nilsen Gjøsund (VP of Investor Relations)

Thank you. I would like to thank everyone for participating in this conference call. If you have any follow-up questions to the management, there are contact details in the press release, or you can get in touch with us through the contact pages on our web page, www.sflcorp.com. Thank you all for listening.