Frontline Execs. Approve $321 M Four-Tanker Purchase

Norwegian shipping group Frontline said on Tuesday its board had approved the firm taking a 33 percent stake of a partnership buying four tankers from Bergesen valued at $321 million.

Bergesen on Friday made a preliminary agreement to sell four tankers to a consortium, Tankers International, led by Frontline.

"The remaining interest in the joint venture will be taken up by other partners in Tankers International," Frontline said in a statement.

"The ships will be financed through the joint venture and it is anticipated that Frontline's equity investment in the four ships will be less than $35 million," it said.

The deal included two tankers and contracts to build two new tankers. The sales price of the two tankers was $164 million, while the new contracts had a total value of $157 million.

The four tankers were part of a series of eight tanker projects that Bergesen acquired from the Hitachi yard in Japan in January 2000.

Frontline said its board also agreed to buy the remaining 47.2 percent in a unit of Moseagle Invest K/S, which controls a VLCC tanker scheduled to be delivered from Samsung in Korea in November 2001.