Offshore staff
HAMILTON, Bermuda -- Seadrill Ltd. and Ship Finance International Ltd. have agreed to a sale and leaseback arrangement whereby Seadrill will sell the ultra deepwater drillship West Polaris for $850 million and simultaneously lease the unit for 15 years.
Under the arrangement, Seadrill has six options to repurchase the unit during the charter period. The first repurchase option may be exercised after 51 months at $548 million while the last repurchase option may be exercised after 15 years at $177.5 million.
The aggregate lease payment for the first 51 months totals approximately $491 million, which equals a bareboat day rate of some $330,000 per day. For the remaining lease period, the aggregate lease payment is approximately $631 million or an average bareboat rate of some $161,000 per day.
West Polaris is in its final stages of commissioning at Samsung Heavy Industries' yard in Korea and is expected to be delivered for the June 30, 2008, contractual delivery date. The drillship is chartered to Esso Exploration Inc. under a four-year contract at a dayrate of $544,000 for the first three years and $602,000 for the fourth year.
05/19/2008
