Royal Caribbean Group (RCG), the second largest cruise shipping group in the world, has booked a deep loss in the second quarter and raised liquidity so that it can continue to weather the Covid-19 storm.

Net loss amounted to $1.6 billion in the second quarter of this year compared to a profit of $472.8 million in the same period last year.

The company has taken a number of steps to strengthen its finances in the recent past. These include:

-The issuance of $1.0 billion of priority guaranteed notes and $1.15 billion of convertible notes;

-The issuance of GBP 300 million of commercial paper in the UK providing over $370 million of additional liquidity;

-Completed a $0.9 billion 12-month debt amortization holiday from all export-credit backed facilities;

-Amended over $11 billion of commercial bank and export credit facilities to provide covenant waivers through the fourth quarter of 2021; and

-Further reduced operating expenses due to the fleet layup measures and actions to decrease sales, marketing and administrative expenses.

As per 30 June, debt worth $300 million was to mature before the end of this year, while $1.3 billion would mature in 2021.

RCG has $11.3 billion of committed credit facilities that are available to fund ship deliveries originally planned through 2025.

The company had $4.1 billion in liquidity at the end of the quarter and it reiterated its earlier assessment that its cash burn amounts to about $250 million to $290 million per month, it said.