Pangaea Logistics Solutions, Ltd. (NASDAQ:PANL) Q4 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Gianni Del Signore: Well, we’re pretty close to the end of the quarter here, so I don’t expect significant changes to what we said. But you’re right, the fleet remains around, we’re still around 45 to 50 vessels. Q4, we had about 44 total fleet. So yeah, I think as far as volume of activity, it’s relatively similar. And then since we are pretty close to the end, I think the numbers that we gave there are a very good indication of what it will be for the full quarter.

Poe Fratt: Okay, great. And then, Mads, are you — or I guess another thing on just the forward cover, I mean, do you have — for the rest of the year, are you — can you give me an idea of sort of how your forward cover looks for the rest of the year and then your chartered-in costs? Are you willing to sort of look beyond just this quarter or this exact date and time?

Mark Filanowski: So we — Poe, we don’t give out beyond the first quarter. But as far as our core business, the sort of core contract that we’re operating in our typical long-term cover, we discussed our long-term cover on our own fleet remains the same. But in the near term, we’re always booking forward into subsequent quarters and the market is always changing. But we haven’t really — we haven’t given out those longer term other than our long term numbers on our long term contracts.

Mads Petersen: And in terms of the chartered-in fleet, Poe, our approach or strategy around that hasn’t really changed. The vast majority of that is short-term in nature, so that will always reprice relatively quickly. We’re not looking to add up a significant amount of chartered-in [indiscernible] longer period, for instance. That’s not part of the strategy, really.

Poe Fratt: Yeah, you sort of want to avoid taking market bets other than with your own fleet, right, Mads? You don’t want to charter in long term and get exposed to negative moves in the market.

Mads Petersen: Yeah, 100% correct, right. I mean the chartered-in fleet for us is essentially an arbitrage around the own fleet and a way to employ the entire fleet of the company in a more sort of sensible way rather than ending up ballasting too fast and pick up a cargo just because you don’t want to fix it in the ship. So it goes back to what Mark said earlier that you sort of have to look at the whole, not just pick out the charter in because it serves a purpose in the greater picture of things where you will in a quarter like this, you can have a quarter that just in that particular part of the business, looks a little disrupted as Mark said.

Poe Fratt: Yeah, and I know that you’re hesitant to sort of talk about your forward cover book, but has anything changed where you typically have 10 to 12 working — 10 to 12 ice class vessels working during the ice season over the course of, call it, the summer and early fall?

Mads Petersen: Yeah, that part of the fleet is owned, primarily so. So we don’t expect any huge changes in that part of the fleet, no.

Mark Filanowski: But if we have booked other business that those ships now have to leave to go north into the Arctic, we may, it is a more active part of the season for us, that third quarter, not just because the ships go north, but because then we have to replace, take some ships from the market to participate in moving cargoes that we’ve booked. We probably have a little higher chartered-in fleet during that period.

Poe Fratt: Okay. And then, Mads, are you seeing anything on the demand side, changes either positive, negative that you can highlight for the rest of the year?

Mads Petersen: I think I want to point to what’s in Mark’s written comments that we are seeing increased amounts in the businesses and in trades where we’re pretty busy such as construction material. That is not just across the ships we own or operate but also in our terminals business. So we feel pretty confident about the demand going forward there in those commodities. I mean, we’re not a big sort of long haul iron ore owner operator. So there, I think, I read the same data that you do and I think demand-wise, things look pretty good, not fantastic, but okay. And that combined with an attractive supply side, we feel pretty confident about where the market is and where it’s heading.