Stelmar Announces Delivery of Second Panamax Tanker

Stelmar Shipping Ltd. announced that it has taken delivery of a double-hull Panamax tanker, the Silvermar, from the Daewoo Shipbuilding and Marine Engineering Company Ltd. The tanker has entered into a previously announced five year time charter at $18,500 per day. The Silvermar is sister ship to the Rubymar, Jademar, Pearlmar, and Rosemar which were delivered in the first five months of 2002, and entered into twenty-four month time charters at an average rate of $18,000 per day. The Silvermar is the second Panamax tanker purchased from the proceeds raised in Stelmar's recent secondary stock offering. Sister ship, The Goldmar, was delivered on May 29, 2002. Peter R. Goodfellow, Chief Executive Officer and President said, "In addition to completing our 2002 new building program, we have successfully received delivery of both Panamax tankers from our recent stock offering. All of the Panamax tankers that we received in 2002 have been deployed on profitable time charter contracts ranging from two to five years at an average rate of $18,200. The Panamax newbuilding program has positioned us to benefit from positive supply and demand fundamentals of the Panamax market as well as increase our long-term earnings visibility by locking the vessels into profitable time charter contracts." Stelmar also announced that it will exceed consensus estimates of $0.69 per share for the second quarter ending June 30, 2002. Stelmar expects to earn between $0.71 and $.73 per share for the second quarter 2002. Goodfellow added, "The second quarter of 2002 marks the sixth consecutive quarter of profitability since Stelmar went public in March, 2001 and the 30th since its inception. Despite a difficult tanker market, we have expanded our fleet and continue to sign profitable time charter contracts. Stelmar has secured 77 percent of the net operating days of its fleet on profitable time charters for 2002 and 44 percent for 2003, equivalent to $128 million and $87 million respectively."