Genting Hong Kong cut cruise and shipbuilding losses in 2018
Genting Hong Kong, the Hong Kong listed company which owns three cruise brands and the German MV Werften shipyard group, has reduced losses from both its cruise and shipbuilding activities last year.
The group’s cruise operations that comprise Crystal Cruises, Dream Cruise and Star Cruise, increased revenues to $1.35 billion from $1.02 billion in 2017. Net loss narrowed to $24.7 million from $186.1 million.
The sector’s performance was helped by 12% increase in gross yield and 15% increase in net yield, while net cruise costs increased 11%, mainly due to increase in capacity days but net cruise costs per capacity day were reduced by 6.5% due to efficiencies of scale.
Last year was the first one with two 151,000 gross ton Dream Cruises ships in service for the full year, which lifted the number of capacity days by 18.5%, the company said.
The groups shipyards, on a standalone basis, recorded an EBITDA of $3.6 million in 2018 versus a loss of $82.5 million in the year before due to higher shipyard utilisation rate with 36% completion of the Crystal Endeavor and 20% of the first Dream Cruises Global Class ships in 2018.
“However, as the shipyard is wholly owned by the Group, certain revenues and expenses relating to shipbuilding for the Group have to be eliminated during consolidation of accounts, resulting in a lower loss of $59.6 million in 2018 as compared with 2017 loss of $102.6 million for the shipyard segment,” Genting Hong Kong said.
Looking ahead, the company said cruise segment results should continue to improve in 2019 due to the low penetration rate in Asia and reduction in cruise capacity in China. The shipyard segment is expected to improve with 82% of the Crystal Endeavor and 65% of the first Global Class ship due to be completed by the end of 2019. “With that, the Group results should continue to improve in 2019,” Genting Hong Kong said.
