August 26, 2013 [Ship & Bunker] - Global oil and storage company Royal Vopak N.V. (Vopak) reports a 5 percent drop in its profits year-over-year to €162.3 million ($217.4 million) for the first half of 2013 as the Rotterdam area faced a "challenging oil and gasoil storage market."
The company said it found a healthy demand for storage in North America, Asia, and the Middle East. Revenues increased by less than 1 percent to €648.8 million ($869.0 million).
Over the year, the company increased its worldwide storage capacity by 4 percent to 30.4 million cubic meters, but its occupancy rate fell to 88 percent from 91 percent in H1 2012.
In the past six months, the company had added new capacity in Banyan, Singapore and Algeciras, Spain while divesting two relatively small terminals in the Netherlands and China, as part of a “continuous drive to further align our terminal network with long-term market developments,” CEO and Executive Board Chairman Eelco Hoekstra said.
“We remain confident in the long-term outlook for our business,” Hoekstra said.
“We keep focusing on improving our frontline execution and our competitive position in order to continue providing our services in the safest, most sustainable and efficient manner for our clients.”
The company’s projects under construction should add 4.6 million cubic meters of storage capacity by the end of 2015 at a total cost to Vopak and its partners of about €1.7 billion ($2.3 billion), bringing its overall capacity to about 35 million cubic meters.
Vopack announced in June that it planned to build new liquefied natural gas (LNG) storage terminals in Asia and elsewhere.
