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Transcript Summary

Danaos Corporation reported a strong start to 2026, with adjusted EPS rising to $6.72 and net income reaching $122.5 million. CEO Dr. John Coustas highlighted the company's resilience amidst geopolitical tensions in the Gulf and its strategic expansion in the dry bulk and energy sectors. The dry bulk fleet significantly outperformed previous years, with TCE rates averaging $24,825 per day. Danaos expanded its order book to include four Newcastlemax vessels and two new container ships, bringing its pro forma fleet to 119 vessels. CFO Evangelos Chatzis emphasized the company’s financial health, noting a $4.1 billion revenue backlog and $1.3 billion in total liquidity. The balance sheet remains exceptionally strong with a net debt to adjusted EBITDA ratio of 0.2x. During the Q&A, management discussed their strategic pivot toward the LNG sector, viewing it as a long-term growth driver. While the company maintains a $300 million share repurchase program, they indicated a more cautious approach to buybacks given the stock’s recent peak performance. A dividend of $0.90 per share was declared, reflecting continued commitment to shareholder returns alongside disciplined capital deployment.

5-year share-count history (top 10 holders by peak, incl. exited) + price

Filing Risk Scores

Danaos Corporation: Aggressive Related-Party Fee Layering Amidst Massive Newbuilding Capex

Full Earnings Call Transcript — Q1 • 2026-05-12

Operator: Good day, and welcome to Danaos Corporation conference call to discuss the financial results for the 3 months ended March 31, 2026. As a reminder, today's call is being recorded. Hosting the call today is Dr. John Coustas, Chief Executive Officer of Danaos Corporation; and Mr. Evangelos Chatzis, Chief Financial Officer of Danaos Corporation. Dr. Coustas and Mr. Chatzis will be making some introductory comments, and we will open the call for a question-and-answer session.
Evangelos Chatzis: Thank you, operator. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. Before we begin, I quickly want to remind everyone that management's remarks this morning may contain certain forward-looking statements and that actual results could differ materially from those projected today. These forward-looking statements are made as of today, and we undertake no obligation to update them. Factors that might affect future results are discussed in our filings with the SEC, and we encourage you to review these detailed safe harbor and risk factor disclosures. Please also note that where we feel appropriate, we will continue to refer to non-GAAP financial measures such as EBITDA, adjusted EBITDA, adjusted net income, time charter equivalent revenues and time charter equivalent dollars per day to evaluate our business. Reconciliations of non-GAAP financial measures to GAAP financial measures are included in our earnings release and accompanying materials. With that, let me now turn over the call to Dr. John Coustas, who will provide the broad overview of the quarter. John?
John Coustas: Thank you, Evangelos. Good morning, and thank you all for joining today's call to discuss our results for the first quarter of 2026. This quarter was shaped by the unprecedented events in the Gulf and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, a situation that is still unfolding, but which we hope will be resolved in the coming weeks. The disruption has primarily benefited the tanker sector where rates spiked sharply before quickly normalizing. In the container sector, the disruption helped stabilize and lift certain box rates. However, it did not have a significant effect. Two of our vessels currently remain in the Gulf, but this does not affect our earnings as both vessels continue to be on charter. The dry bulk market has improved considerably and continues to strengthen. Our optimistic outlook for this market prompted us to expand our order book to 4 Newcastlemaxes for 2028 delivery. We also ordered 2 5,000 TEU container ships for 2027 delivery, both of which are backed by 3-year charters. Together with charter arrangements for our existing fleet, these additions position us with a pro forma fleet of 104 container ships and 15 Capesize and Newcastlemax vessels with a $4.1 billion contracted revenue backlog. Combined with $1.3 billion of liquidity, this positions us to continue pursuing accretive opportunities as they arise. Resolution of the conflicts in the Gulf and Ukraine should bring meaningful stability for years to come, absent new initiatives by the major global powers. Last year's developments demonstrated that globalization remains resilient and that protection is likely to be the exception rather than the rule going forward. Trade is becoming increasingly multilateral, which benefits the midsized containership segment in which we are actively investing. Together with a disciplined expansion strategy, we believe these dynamics will continue to drive improved profitability and create value for our shareholders. With that, I hand over the call back to Evangelos, who will take you through the financials for the quarter. Evangelos?
Evangelos Chatzis: Thank you, John, and good morning again to everyone. I will briefly review the results for the quarter and then open the call to Q&A. We are reporting adjusted EPS for this quarter of $6.72 per share or adjusted net income of $122.5 million compared to adjusted EPS of $6.04 per share or adjusted net income of $113.4 million for the corresponding first quarter of 2025. This $9.1 million increase in adjusted net income between the 2 quarters is the combined result of a $0.4 million increase in operating revenues, a $4.4 million improvement in total operating expenses, a $2.4 million improvement in net finance expenses, combined with a $2 million increase in dividend income, partially offset by a $0.1 million increase in loss on equity investments. Operating revenues of our containership fleet decreased by $6.6 million, as a result of a $6.9 million decrease in revenues due to lower contracted charter rates and a $7.2 million decrease due to lower noncash U.S. GAAP revenue recognition accounting. And these were partially offset by a $3.9 million increase in revenues as a result of newbuilding containership vessel additions and $3.6 million of incremental revenues as a result of improved container fleet utilization between the 2 quarters. Operating revenues of our dry bulk fleet that is deployed in the spot market increased by $7 million, primarily due to a significant improvement in time charter equivalent earnings that averaged $24,825 per day during this quarter compared to $10,500 approximately per day for the first quarter of 2025. Vessel operating expenses dropped by $1.7 million to $50 million in the current quarter from $51.7 million in the first quarter of 2025 despite the increase in the average number of vessels in our fleet. This improvement was mainly driven by lower repairs and maintenance expenses with our daily operating cost declining to $6,680 per vessel per day for this quarter compared to $7,028 per vessel per day in the first quarter of 2025. Our operating costs continue to remain among the most competitive in the industry. G&A expenses increased by $2.4 million to $14.6 million in the current quarter compared to $12.2 million in the corresponding first quarter of 2025. This is mainly attributable to $1.3 million in higher management fees driven by the increase in the average number of vessels in our fleet as well as a $1.1 million increase in corporate G&A. Interest expense, excluding finance costs and debt finance cost amortization increased by $1.7 million to $10.9 million in the current quarter compared to $9.2 million in the first quarter of last year. This increase is a combined result of a $4.5 million increase in interest expense due to higher average indebtedness between the 2 periods by $330 million, and that was partially offset by a reduction in the cost of debt service by approximately 50 basis points, mainly as a result of reduced SOFR rates. We also had $2.8 million reduction in interest expense due to higher capitalized interest on vessels under construction between the 2 periods. At the same time, interest income came in at $7.6 million versus $3.6 million in the corresponding first quarter of 2025, mainly due to higher average cash balances. Adjusted EBITDA increased by 5.2% or by $8.9 million to $180.6 million in the current quarter from $171.7 million in the first quarter of 2025 for the reasons that have already been outlined earlier on this call. We also encourage you to review our updated investor presentation that is posted on our website as well as all subsequent events disclosures. Since the date of our last earnings release, we have added $120 million to our contracted revenue backlog. As a result, our contract revenue backlog for our containership fleet now stands at $4.1 billion with a 4.2-year average charter duration. Contract coverage stands at 100% for this year -- for the remainder of this year, 88% for 2027 and 65% for 2028. Our investor presentation has analytical disclosure on our contracted charter book. As of March 31, 2026, our net debt stood at $170 million that translates to a net debt to adjusted EBITDA ratio of 0.2x, while 67 out of our 86 vessels are unencumbered and debt-free, while an extra 12 unencumbered vessels that secure our revolving credit facility are also debt-free. We have declared a dividend of $0.90 per share for this quarter, and we currently have $65 million remaining authority to repurchase stock under our $300 million share repurchase program. Finally, as of the end of the first quarter of 2026, Cash stood at $0.9 billion, while total liquidity, including availability under our revolving credit facility and marketable securities stood at $1.3 billion, giving us ample flexibility to pursue accretive capital deployment opportunities. With that, I would like to thank you for listening to this first part of our call. Operator, we are now ready to open the call to Q&A.
Operator: [Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from Omar Nokta with Clarksons.
Omar Nokta: Just a couple of things on my side. Just wanted to ask about investments from here. Your last couple of investments outside of your core focus seem to be in LNG, both in the stake in Yoda. You also invested in the Alaska LNG project earlier this year. Is this a concerted effort on your part to get a bit deeper into LNG? Should we be expecting more of this type of investment going forward?
John Coustas: Yes. I think the -- in general, the energy sector is, let's say, our next point of focus. And as we see geopolitically, there are a lot of changes in that area. So we are following it very closely, and we try to address it from every angle, both from the angle of transportation and also from the angle of LNG production itself, which is going to give us an access to the transportation as well.
Omar Nokta: Okay. Got it. That's helpful. And then just maybe in terms of what we're seeing in the container shipping market, your revenue backlog is at $4.1 billion, which is obviously very strong historically. It is a little bit down from where you were last quarter, which I think was $4.3 billion. In general, it looks like backlog additions maybe have been a bit leaner these past couple of months, even though we are seeing indexes for the time charter indexes being at all-time highs or near all-time highs. What are you seeing kind of at the moment in terms of liner interest for more charter coverage from here?
John Coustas: From what you see from the profile, practically all '26 and '27 are almost fixed. We have very, very little going forward. Now also for liner companies to start discussing from now about 2028, let's say, ships might be a bit premature, especially for secondhand. So I don't think really it signifies anything else apart from that, we have been really fixing quite a lot in this period of time. And it's just circumstantial.
Omar Nokta: Okay. That certainly makes sense. Just nothing is available to be booked in the next several quarters. Okay. And maybe just one final one. Thoughts on the share buyback. You've obviously historically been quite active on that front. You bought a bit during the first quarter, not at the same pace we've seen at least in the fourth quarter. And I guess that sort of makes sense given the shares have really been hitting 52-week highs seemingly every week. How are you thinking about the buyback from here? I guess, in the context of maybe 2 things. One, the shares are obviously at their highs. How do you think about the buyback from that perspective, but then also from the perspective of asset value on an NAV basis, it's discounted and then perhaps on a free cash flow yield, the yield is quite high. So how are you thinking about those 2 things with respect to the buyback?
John Coustas: Well, we still have the authority for another $65 million. We are keeping closely. I mean, the stock has done a terrific run in the last few months. We are at kind of all-time high. And so although we still believe that it's -- the stock is deeply undervalued. We are kind of more cautious into continuing during this hype to continue the buyback.
Operator: Our next question comes from Climent Molins with Value Investor.
Climent Molins: Omar has already covered a lot of ground, but I wanted to ask about the utilization on the Capesize side of the fleet. Could you talk a bit about the drivers behind the significant scheduled off-hire for the quarter? Was it mostly dry dockings? And secondly, could you remind us about the dry-docking schedule on this side of the fleet for the remainder of the year?
Evangelos Chatzis: Yes, it was 2 vessels that went to dry dock in Q1. And I don't have it offhand, but I don't think we have any more scheduled vessels on the dry side to the shipyard for the remainder of this year.
Climent Molins: Okay. That's helpful. And all the off-hire days were attributable to these 2 vessels?
Evangelos Chatzis: Sorry, say again?
Climent Molins: I was asking if all the off-hire days in Q1 were attributable to the dry docking you conducted.
Evangelos Chatzis: Yes. Correct.
Operator: It appears we have no further questions at this time. I would like to turn the call back over to Dr. Coustas for any further comments or closing remarks.
John Coustas: Thank you all for joining this conference call and your continued interest in our story. Look forward to hosting you on our next earnings call. Have a nice day.
Operator: Thank you. The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.