Star Bulk Carriers Corp.

Thank you for standing by, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Starbalk Carriers Conference Call on the second quarter 2025 financial results. With us today, Mr. Petros Papas, Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Hamish Norton, President, Mr. Simos Spirou, and Mr. Cristos Begleris, Co-Chief Financial Officers, Mr. Nikos Raskos, Chief Operating Officer, Mrs. Charis Plakantonaki, Chief Strategy Officer of the company, and Constantino Cimentiras, Head of Market Analysis of the company. At this time, all participants are in the listen-only mode. There will be a presentation followed by a question and answer session, at which time, if you wish to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad and wait for your to be announced. I must advise you that this conference is being recorded today. We now pass the floor to one of our speakers, Mr. Spirou. Please go ahead.

Thank you, operator. I am Simos Spirou, Co-Chief Financial Officer of Starbalk Carriers, and I would like to welcome you to our conference call regarding our financial results for the second quarter of 2025. Before we begin, I kindly ask you to take a moment to read the safe harbor statement on slide number two of our presentation. In today's presentation, we will go through our Q2 highlights results, actions taken to create value for our shareholders, cash evolution during the quarter, assault update on the merger synergies, vessel operations, fleet update, the latest on the regulatory front, and our views on the industry fundamentals before opening up for questions. Let us now turn to slide number three of the presentation for a summary of our second quarter 2025 highlights. The company reported the following. Net income amounted to $40,000 with adjusted net income of $13.2 million or 11 cents per share adjusted net income. Adjusted EBITDA was $69 million for the quarter. During the second quarter, we repurchased 3.3 million shares for a total of $54 million. Our board of directors decided to continue prioritizing returns to shareholders given the company's strong position, declaring a dividend of five cents per share for the quarter, payable on September 10th. Our total cash today stands at $407 million. Meanwhile, our total debt stands at $1.12 billion. Through our own revolver facilities, we have additional liquidity of $115 million, resulting to pro forma liquidity of more than half a billion. Finally, we currently have 12 debt-free vessels with an aggregate market value of $246 million. On the top right of the page, you will see our daily figures per vessel for the quarter. Our time charter equivalent rate was $13,624 per vessel per day. Our combined daily operating expenses and net cash G&A expenses per vessel per day amounted to $6,277 per vessel. Therefore, our time charter equivalent, less OPEX, less G&A, is approximately $7,350 per day per vessel. Slide four provides an overview of the company's capital allocation policy over the last three years and the various levels we have used to strengthen the company, increase the intrinsic value for shares, and return capital to our shareholders. In total, since 2021, we have taken actions totaling $2.75 billion in dividends, share buybacks, and debt repayment to create value for our shareholders. At the same time, Starbucks has been growing the platform at opportune times through consecutive flip buyouts by issuing shares at or above NAV. On the bottom of the page, we saw our net debt evolution. Since 2021, our average net debt has been reduced by 46%, reaching a level where it is covered by the flip scrap value. Given the flip growth on a per vessel basis, it has decreased from $11.2 million per vessel to $5.3 million per vessel, a reduction of more than 53%. Slide five graphically illustrates the changes in the company's cash balance during the second quarter. We started the quarter with $437 million in cash. We generated positive cash flow from operating activities of $55 million. After including debt proceeds and repayments, cap experiments for energy saving devices and ballast water treatment systems, installations, vessel sale proceeds, share buybacks, and the first quarter dividend payment, we arrived at a cash balance of $431 million at the end of the quarter. I will now pass the floor to our Chief Operating Officer, Nikos Reskos, for an update on synergies and our operational performance. Thank you, Simo.

Slide six provides an update on the integration and synergies. We are now closing the first year marks in stable acquisition, near completion of our strategy in realizing significant cost savings in operating and jar and administrative expenses. Over 53 million of cumulative cost synergies have been achieved since April 2024. Cost synergies achieved during Q2 2025 stand at approximately 13 million. The operating expense in G&A savings for the ego fleet are approximately $1,990 per vessel per day. We expect to complete the phase out of third-party crew managers by Q3 2025 and replacing with our crew platform, hence meeting our targeted cost optimization. Please turn to slide seven, where we provide an operational update. Operating expenses for Q2 2025 start at $4,928. Net gas G&A expenses were $1,349 per vessel per day for the same period. In addition, we continue to rate as a total amongst our listed peers in terms of ride ship safety score. Slide eight provides a fleet update and some guidance around our future dry dock and the relevant total of hard days. On the bottom of the page, we provide our expected dry dock expense schedule, which for the remaining of the year is estimated at $33 million for the dry docking of 30 vessels. In total, we expect to have approximately 1,000 of hard days for the same period. On the top right of the page, we have our capex schedule, illustrating our new building capex and vessel energy efficiency upgrade expenses. Based on our latest construction schedule, our five Capsamax new building vessels constructed in the shipyard are expected to be delivered during 2026. For these vessels, we have secured $130 million of debt financing against the new building installments. In line with our MO carbon reduction regulations, we will continue investing in upgrading our fleet with the latest operational technologies available, aimed at improving our fuel consumption and using our environmental footprint, enhancing the commercial attractiveness of the dry dock fleet. We gather energy saving technologies, the recovery program, we have so far completed 47 explanations, with another 13 plans for 2025. Please turn to slide nine for an update on our fleet. On the vessel sales front, we continue disposing of non-Eco vessels opportunistically, reducing our average age and improving overall fleet efficiency. During the second quarter, we agreed to sell and deliver to the new owners some of our less efficient Supermax and Capsamax vessels, Tuffin Bulker, Star Canary, Star Patrol, Oriole and Star Georgia. Furthermore, during the second quarter, we have further agreed to sell Star Knight, Star Runner, Star Deni, Star Gold, Star Piper and Star O, which are expected to be delivered to the new owners by the end of the year. We expect to receive an aggregate net sales of $104 million during Q3 and Q4 2025. Following the roll over of vehicle bulk, existing chartering contracts, we now have a total of eight chartering vessels. Considering the information changes on our fleet links, we operate one of the largest dry bulk fleets amongst US and European listed peers, with 142 vessels on a fully delivered basis, and with an average age of 11.9 years. I will now pass the floor to our Chief Strategy Officer, Haris Plakadanaki, for an update on recent global environmental regulation developments.