Ernst Russ AG ($ERAG)

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and a warm welcome to today's earnings call of the Ernst Russ AG following the publication of the first quarter results of 2026. I'm delighted to welcome Co-CEO and CFO, Dr. Christopher Eilers; as well as Co-CEO and CCO, Joseph Schuchmann. So the gentlemen will guide us through the presentation and the results, followed by a Q&A session where we will be happy to take your questions. And having said that, Joseph, I hand over to you.

Thank you for the kind introduction, Sarah. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Ernst Russ AG earnings call for the first quarter 2026. My name, as Sarah said, is Joseph Schuchmann. I'm the Co-CEO and Chief Commercial Officer of Ernst Russ, and I'm joined today by our Co-CEO and CFO, Dr. Christopher Eilers. We are pleased to have you with us today and look forward to sharing our first quarter results. This is our second earnings call after a home run earnings call last time with a record attendance, and we are providing an overview on our latest transactions, discussing our continued strategic progress, and we'll give you a clear view of the path ahead. As you know, we have a lot of strategic matters going on. A few housekeeping notes before we begin. This call is being recorded. Please hold your questions or type them into the chat and then Sarah will moderate the Q&A session. And some bedside reading; this presentation includes forward-looking statements. So please take them as such. Let me get into the agenda. I will start with an introduction to our business model. For those of you who are new to Ernst Russ, I will follow with a brief overview of the markets, our current fleet and the charter coverage. And then Christoph will take you through the financial results for the first quarter in greater detail. We'll then close with our strategic outlook and guidance for the full year 2026. Afterwards, Q&A, as I said. So let's dive right in. For those of you who are new, a brief introduction. Ernst Russ AG is a tonnage provider. So we are a ship owner. We supply our shipping assets to freight companies who charter these vessels from us, rent them to service their customers who basically want to get their goods from A to B. So basically, we are a flexibility provider, and we offer 2 kinds of flexibility: a, operational flexibility, allowing our customers to scale up and down their operation, and we also offer balance sheet flexibility through long-term operating lease structures for those of our customers who look to grow long term without tying up too much capital. Our model is deliberately clean. We focus on investments, commercial management and ship financing, and outsource crewing, maintenance, insurance, the actual operation of our vessel. We do that with a select group of trusted partners. Maybe for, again, those of you who are new, the way it works is our customers pay us a daily charter rate for the use of our vessels and they, in turn, earn a freight rate for the freight services they offer. So for, let's say, one container, they get a certain freight rate from A to B or for one ton of grain, they get a certain freight rate from A to B, and they give us the charter rate in turn for the vessel. If we look into the market, let's maybe walk through this as this is kind of new. We've updated this slide to showcase our strategic drive towards a more diverse fleet. The different shipping segments that we are invested in right now, container, chemical tankers, bulkers and multipurpose ships, they have some similarities, but they have largely uncorrelated charter rates. We have now created for you some composite indexes that show these 4 relevant sectors and the different sizes that are relevant for Ernst Russ and the development over the last 12 months. For the last 12 months, containership rates have remained firm. They've climbed 6.3 points and multipurpose rates have decreased by 1.5 points. Chemical tanker rates declined by 6 points and bulk carriers jumped 13.9 points. Please note, this is indexed based on the 12-month cycle. So the base of that is April 2025. And it shows how the different segments fare in a certain environment. And this is exactly the point of our diversification that in any given point in time, the segments will react differently to the market environment. Of course, currently, our core segment is the container segment, and we are quite happy that the rates there have developed nicely. This is also relevant for you as shareholders as in the new segments, of course, we have contracted long-term charter parties. So the current environment is not necessarily the most relevant for us. And then on the existing fleet on the container ships, of course we have some recontracting going on. And there, the development, as you will see later in the numbers, does have an impact on our earnings. On the geopolitical side, I mean, a lot has changed since the last time we talked. But in general, turmoil is still all around, maybe starting with the Red Sea that we've had for 2.5 years now. Red Sea and Gulf of Aden remain largely closed to most of commercial shipping. If you look at containers in April 2026, 754 container ships with about 10 million TEU avoided the Suez Canal and sailed around of Good Hope. So the diversion around the Cape of Good Hope adds approximately 14 days to the voyage and that effectively squeezes the supply of ships because the longer you take, the more ships you need to transport the same amount of cargo. If the container lines gradually decide to return to the Red Sea, if the picture gets safer, then, of course, a softening in charter rates can be expected. Then coming to the Persian Gulf, which is really, of course, the topic of the last 90 days. It's, first of all, important to say that we are currently not having any ships in the Gulf. So our direct operational impact to the Strait of Hormuz crisis is limited. Of course, the total impact on shipping industry and the global economy is vast. So the total vessel transit through the strait has fallen by 91%; still some ships going through, but under very dangerous or sanctioned circumstances. To understand sort of the size of the Strait of Hormuz in commodity terms, 20% of the world's oil was flowing through pre-conflict, 37% of seaborne crude oil actually. So this crude oil that is actually shipped on ships, 37% of that. 19% of refined petroleum products, 4% of dry bulk, 3% of container trade, and there's now a lot of ships being stuck in the Gulf, which is also reducing capacity, of course, on the global fleet. When you look at this picture, as I said, our investment rationale is to diversify across the segments exactly because they are impacted differently by these events. And paired with the long-term charter rates that we execute, we aim to generate stable cash flows. And this rationale, as we have communicated over the last 1.5 years, has not changed, and we argue it increasingly validates itself with what's going on in the world. When we look at our fleet, this is as of end of quarter, so 31st of March, we had 26 ships on the water. You see one ship that has been joined the multipurpose ship; the second of the 2 that we bought has since joined. So now we have 27 ships on the water. And maybe also this is a good moment to go through the acquisitions that we have done in the last months. So during Q1, we announced the acquisition of 2 multipurpose vessels. They are now in our fleet, Ronnie and Charlie. They are both on 7-year time charters. And this is -- we've had one multipurpose ship before. So as you know, this is an expansion of that diversified fleet. And the first vessel was handed over in Q1. That's why it's listed here as a vessel on water. And the second one is -- came over in April. So she is now in the fleet as well. A few weeks later, unfortunately not in Q1, but 15 days later, we announced our entry into the tanker segment. We agreed to acquire 4 intermediate tanker newbuildings. These are scheduled for handover between the fourth quarter of 2026 and the second quarter of 2027. They're all secured with fixed time charter of at least 5 years. And this is actually a very significant milestone because the multipurpose segment was, of course, an expansion in an existing segment, and our entry into this new segment is really significant for us. We do have to say that we were managing, as Ernst Russ, tanker investments in the past. We've not done so in the past 5 years, and this is the first time that these tankers actually enter our balance sheet and are not in our fleet as an investment manager. So we're very excited about this development. And this is, of course, fully in line with what we've stated, again with our diversified strategy, long-term charter contracts and very excited about that. One further thing we announced last week is the sale of one of our older ships, EF Emira. She's 3 things. She is a container ship where, of course, we have most exposure. So if we want to have a true diversified fleet, that is an exposure that in relative terms will have to come down somewhat. She is an older vessel, which is good in relationship to -- we are buying younger vessels, selling older ships to renew our fleet. And she is a joint venture ship. And as we've also communicated, we aim to simplify our balance sheet and our earnings, basically structure for our shareholders, so you might better understand how the cash flows generated actually end up with you. So this disposal of this ship strikes sort of all of these 3 objectives. As a result, we were able to raise our EBIT forecast, but Christopher will follow with that afterwards. I think taken together, these transactions demonstrate that we are executing our growth strategy. We're executing it on a significant amount of speed as we've basically been on this road for the last 1.5 years and quite a bit of discipline as well because as you see, the market environments are quite volatile, lots of things going on in the world, and you really need to stay disciplined in order to stay on your strategic path and not get carried away with the market. Looking at this slide, this is new. This looks a bit different. That's a good sign. We now have 2 pages for our fleet overview because we had to dissect the container ships and the other fleet, which means we're growing, which is good. When we look at the container charter coverage, you can see that one ship there is marked as sold and that we only have 2 other ships remaining to be rechartered in this year. They will be up for recharter end of this year. And of course, when something is to be said about that, then we will communicate that clearly. Our largest vessel, just to reiterate that, if you look at the minimum charter duration, for example, is chartered out until Q2 2033. So this obviously is a picture of this year's coverage. The page is too small to show the coverage all the way out to 2033. But if you do look on the right side, then you will have an idea of how long some of these charter parties last. This is the new slide, excited about that. We have the extension of our exposure to multipurpose ships. Ronnie and Charlie joined the fleet also with charters until 2033. All new ships that we acquire are on very long-term charter parties. They will be earning stable cash flows for us in the years to come. And the only exception that we have currently in the fleet is our Bulker Rubina, which was trading in a pool, is currently trading in the open market. And the earnings in that market are actually developing quite nicely. And while that development is going on, we are in the open market and we'll then contract something longer term when we see the opportunity to do so. Considering all of our ships together, we now have a minimum charter duration of 34 months on average, which is an increase from last time. Our total charter backlog stands at EUR 620 million, which is also up from last time as this shows sort of the things that we've been doing: enhancing the fleet, positioning ourselves strategically. And again, we are actually quite pleased with the development. These figures do include the vessels incoming and the charter agreements we've done in April and May. So they are as of today, while, of course, the financial results, as you will hear from Christopher, as of end of March. So talking about end of March figures, I will now hand over to Christopher, and he will take you through the details of our financial results for Q1 2026. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Joseph. It's great to have all of you with us and also a very warm welcome from my side, and many thanks for joining us today. So I would like to start by focusing on the financial highlights for the first quarter of 2026. So overall, we generated revenues of EUR 37.8 million compared to EUR 40.9 million in Q1 of last year. So the EBITDA for the quarter came in at EUR 20.5 million compared to EUR 48.1 million in the first quarter of '25. So this development is mainly due to the fact that we sold vessels at the beginning of last year, which resulted in fewer trading days of our fleet, but I will explain this in a little bit more detail in a moment. So looking at our balance sheet, our equity ratio stands at 73.3% and our cash ratio at 195.3%. Also when going through the balance sheet details, we can reflect on that a little bit in more detail. So overall, this resulted in earnings per share for the first quarter of EUR 0.33 per share. So from a longer term perspective, our 3-year average EBITDA, which you can see on the right side of the slide, also stands at 64.2% and our debt-to-equity ratio remains low at 22%. So overall, this reflects our conservative financial profile of our company and we, of course, continue to preserve that even while we are growing the fleet. So now I would like to turn to the profit and loss account, and the main performance indicators in a little bit of more detail. And as already mentioned, revenues in the first quarter amounted to EUR 37.8 million compared to the EUR 40.9 million in the prior year period. So the year-on-year decline is primarily attributable to 2 main factors. First of all, the weaker U.S. dollar against the euro as our charter revenues are denominated in U.S. dollar. On the second side, it is fewer trading days due to a smaller fleet. And both effects were partially offset by a strong increase in our average daily charter rate, which rose by USD 2,663 to USD 19,546, earnings per day or charter rate per day. So this reflects an increase of 15.8%. So as already Joseph has stated, we were also directly benefiting from the positive market development. So turning to the operating income. The sharp decline is primarily driven by the absence of the prior year vessel sale gain for container ship, which was the [ MS Basel ], which we sold in the first quarter of last year. Cost of materials declined by EUR 3.9 million to EUR 15.5 million, and this is, of course, also due to a smaller fleet side. And as you can see on this slide, personnel expenses ashore and other operating expenses remained broadly stable. So taking all these factors together, bottom line, we arrived at an EBITDA of EUR 20.5 million compared to EUR 48.1 million in the first quarter of '25. The depreciation amounted to EUR 7.3 million, resulting in an EBIT of EUR 13.2 million for the first quarter of '26. So as Joseph said, also the first quarter this year, we are very happy with the results. And on the next slide, I would like to continue to look below the EBIT figures. Our non-operating results of EUR 1.8 million in the first quarter of '26 is compared to minus EUR 3 million in the first quarter last year, which was primarily driven by the positive foreign exchange effects, reflecting the movement in the U.S. dollar-euro rate during the quarter. The financial result was EUR 0.5 million, broadly in line with prior year figures, and it reflects the interest earned out of our liquidity holdings. So as a result of these developments, earnings before tax came in at EUR 15.5 million and the profit before minorities at EUR 15.3 million, demonstrating, I think, a very resilient earnings conversion from the operating to the bottom line level. So after deducting minority profit, participation of EUR 4.3 million. Ernst Russ as a group, we realized a profit after minorities of EUR 11 million in the first quarter of 2026. And this, as I already mentioned, translates into an earnings per share of EUR 0.33 for the first quarter. So let us take a closer look to the balance sheet as of the 31st of March '26. So total assets increased from EUR 370.1 million at year-end to EUR 414.3 million at the end of Q1 '26. So the key driver on the asset side is the increase in the vessel assets to EUR 281 million, which has reflected the acquisition of the 2 multipurpose vessels, which Joseph already mentioned. Correspondingly, the liquidity increased to EUR 120 million. On the next slide, we will look into that in a little bit more detail. On the other side of the balance sheet, the equity position grew to EUR 303 million, and the equity ratio stands at 73.3% or 78.6% on an adjusted basis if we add the liabilities to non-controlling interest. So the interest-bearing liabilities increased from EUR 36 million to EUR 67.9 million, which is primarily reflected in the bridge financing we took for the acquisition of the 2 multipurpose vessels. So in summary, the balance sheet, in comparison also to the last year results, remains very robust, capitalized with ample financial headroom to continue and execute on our growth strategy, which Joseph already mentioned. Next slide, I want to briefly walk you through the cash flow for the first quarter. So we started the year with a liquidity of EUR 114.3 million, and operating cash flow came in, in the first quarter, with EUR 17.4 million, which is broadly stable in comparison to the first quarter of '25, which resulted with an operating cash flow of EUR 17.6 million last year. And that reflects, of course, a strong cash generation from the fleet operations and from also the bridge increase of the market development itself. So the cash flow from investing activities was minus EUR 43.6 million compared to a positive EUR 23.8 million in the first quarter of '25. The year-on-year swing, of course, is primarily explained with the acquisition of the 2 multipurpose vessels we have executed in the first quarter this year. And the prior year period included proceeds from the vessel sale, which then, of course, explains the difference in those 2 figures. The cash flow from financing activities was positive with EUR 30.1 million compared to minus EUR 50.6 million (sic) [ EUR 50.9 million ] in the first quarter of last year. The inflow mainly reflects the bridge financing of EUR 33.8 million raised for the MPP acquisitions, and in addition, we recorded a positive exchange rate and valuation effect of EUR 2 million, driven by a stronger U.S. dollar against the euro at the reporting date. So overall, liquidity increased by EUR 5.9 million to EUR 120 million at the end of the first quarter, which gives us, again, a solid foundation for our continued fleet expansion. So after having a quick view on the past, let me now turn to our guidance for the full financial year '26. And as you might have read in the last week in our ad hoc announcement, we were able to raise our EBIT guidance for the full year. It is now in the range between EUR 45 million to EUR 55 million, whereas the previous guidance, as you can see on the slide, was in the range of EUR 34 million to EUR 44 million. So as Joseph already explained, this upward revision results from the earlier-mentioned sale of the EF Emira and is further supported by the positive business performance so far this year. Let me point out that further vessel sales or new business are not anticipated or reflected in our updated guidance. So for the revenue, we are maintaining our guidance range of EUR 145 million to EUR 160 million. And I would like to point out that already EUR 147.5 million of this is already contracted on our long-term charter approach. And of course, please note that this is still depends on future U.S. dollar-euro exchange rate development, which, of course, then is part of our range within the guidance. In terms of the fleet utilization, we are targeting 97% for the full year, which is a conservative approach, taking into account that in the first quarter this year, the fleet utilization was 99.8%. But, of course, looking at the full year, we have to reflect scheduled dry dockings of the vessels, which will take place in '26. So finally, our guidance is based on an assumed foreign exchange rate of USD 1.2 to euro compared to USD 1.13/euros in last year. So the relatively weaker U.S. dollar assumption reflects forward market expectation and this potential currency headwind is, of course, factored into our guidance range. Overall, the guidance upgrade reflects a strong operational start to this year and a strategically well-timed vessel sale, we assume. So together, both factors strengthen our earnings position and our capacity to pursue further growth. And that is more or less as of last time we showcased the strategic road map. So I would like to elaborate a little bit further. So what we call the transformation phase is our first phase, which is now complete or, let's say, nearly complete since we initiated our fleet modernization program, selling older tonnage to rejuvenate the fleet and by focusing on risk mitigation through diversified counterparties and long-term charter contracts. Of course, we will continue this going forward, as demonstrated most recently last week with the sale of Emira. On the capital market side, we successfully grew research coverage over the last year from 1 to 4 analysts, significantly increased our participation in investors conference. So many of the viewers we have probably met in person, and we would like to continue doing so, and enhance our overall capital market activities on a general basis, meaning having the earning calls, having the quarterly reports, et cetera. So we also took decisive steps to reduce corporate complexity by streamlining our ownership structure and disposing of noncore subsidiaries. So now as Joseph has said, we are in the disciplined growth phase. Here, we would focus on the fleet strategy on a diversified yield generation with strong emphasis on risk mitigation. And since our last earnings call, we were able to demonstrate significant progress by entering the tanker segment, acquiring the 4 newbuildings with a long-term employment. And also, we took over the 2 MPP vessels with also a secured long-term charter. So on the capital market side, we are actively working to broaden our investor base and increase the liquidity of our shares. And further, on the, let's say, structural side, financing side, we are in the process of establishing IFRS reporting, which is an important step for us to also being -- or that our financials are more accessible to international investors. And of course, from the balance sheet perspective, we remain disciplined when it comes to the approach of our loan-to-value levels when it comes of financing of our projects. So looking further ahead, our broad vision, we are trying to achieve is reflected in the third phase to become a leading listed European shipping platform with a risk-diversified portfolio approach designed to deliver long-term stability, resilience and, of course, attractive risk-adjusted returns. So we are well aware that a clearly defined dividend strategy and an uplifting to the regulated market will be essential to achieve this. And we believe that this strategic road map provides a clear and compelling path forward, and we look forward to updating you on our continued progress in the quarter ahead so that you can really see the development and the efforts we take into account. So before we open the floor for the questions, let me just quickly draw your attention to our financial calendar of the remainder of this year. Key upcoming dates include our virtual Annual General Meeting next week on the 4th of June, the virtual Scale Summit on the 23rd of June and the mwb inspired conference in Frankfurt on the 24th of June. And our next earnings call will take place on the 25th of August, right after we publish our half year report. So we look forward to stay in close dialogue with all of you and the capital markets community as itself throughout this year and hope to see you not only virtually but also in person in the various events, which I mentioned. So coming to an end of the remarks, Joseph and I are happy to take all of your questions. And first of all, thank you very much for your general interest in Ernst Russ and your continued attention. So now back to Sarah to moderate the Q&A session.

Thank you so much, Christopher and Joseph, for your presentation. So ladies and gentlemen, we're now happy to take your questions that you may have. [Operator Instructions] And then we will start with the first virtual hand from Mr. Wissler. So Mr. Wissler.

Congrats on the good results and how you transformed your fleet and the fleet structure in such a short time. Joseph, you mentioned the multiyear fixed charters for your acquisition pipeline. Particularly for the tankers, could you provide us some context regarding the counterparties? Are these Tier 1 charters? And also could you confirm that the charters agreed lock in the current historically strong tanker market for the entire fixed term?

Yes. So on the counterpart, that is a commercial matter that we can't disclose as of now because these ships haven't been delivered. I'm sure there will become a time where we will be able to say so, but not currently. I think it's always important for you to understand certainly when the rates are this high in the tanker market, the asset values also rise and you always need to take the charter rates in comparison to what you're paying for the ship. So these rates that we have concluded there are historically very strong. But of course, also historically, the asset prices are rather high. I do have to say that these ships and the size they are in, they are not -- this is not the very large crude carriers earning $700,000 a day that you see in the Financial Times that are running through the Strait of Hormuz as at great risk. This is ice class ships for industrial transportation, mostly in the North Atlantic and the Great Lakes region and North Europe. And as they have 5-year plus charter parties, this is much more of a long-term rate that reflects the asset price, but doesn't reflect necessarily the very volatile spot market. I hope that sort of covers it.

Yes, perfect. Understandable that you can't disclose the counterparty at this point in time. But maybe if you look at the MPPs, they come with a 7-year fixed charters, if I'm not mistaken. But maybe you can give us some idea how you hedge against counterparty risk?

Well, our structure in the fleet is a risk -- is a hedge in itself, right? We diversify across counterparties. And then we classify different counterparties in different groups relating to their financial strength. Are they investment grade? Are they not investment grade, but a very, very solid counterpart? And how does that relate to the really the entire fleet, right? So we don't want all ships in one segment with one counterparty. We don't want too many ships with counterparties that are not investment grade, and that's how we balance that risk.

And maybe one last question, if I may. Christopher, you've shown us the cash flow development in Q1. How should we read the cash outflow from your acquisition pipeline in the next couple of quarters?

Well, as Joseph said, we are opportunistically looking at projects. As Joseph said, currently, we have to be very disciplined, having a market condition of rather higher purchase prices. So we need to identify long-term charters who are willing to compensate on that with a long-term charter in place. So as of now, we cannot really anticipate until year-end how many investments we will do. Nevertheless, of course, we have -- despite for the MPPs, we have the tankers we will take over the first end of this year, most probably beginning of next year. And of course, we are looking at opportunities and want to follow up. But the projects themselves must really make sense also in relation to the risk and return profile, which, of course, depends on the quality of the counterparties, on the quality of the length of duration, et cetera. So there is no concrete number we can share as of now because, as you know, it depends on are we buying a smaller container vessel versus a very large bulk carrier or even in the extreme, an LNG carrier. So this is, we have to figure out and map out once the opportunities arise.

Just I think you were referring to the existing acquisition pipeline, meaning the tankers and how that will financially impact us for the coming year, right?

Correct. Yes, whether we should expect the outflow in 2026 in the next couple of quarters or rather in these current...

So on the tankers, especially, these will be delivered end of this year, beginning of next year. Of course, there's always a timing element to that. Will it be in 2026 or 2027? We have paid the deposits for these tankers. And until then -- so until end of year, you will have maximum the outflow of one ship of these tankers. And that's only the equity portion on top of the deposit because we will finance these ships, of course. So for this year, as it stands right now, the impact is fairly limited, I would say.

And then we have another virtual hand in the queue from Mr. [indiscernible].

I have also a couple of questions. First is on the phasing of dockings this year. I mean you had, I think, no docking in the first quarter. And otherwise, I would say it was a very clean quarter. So if I multiple your EPS for the Q1, could be a good idea to arrive at an EPS without disposal -- without the result from the disposal. So the phasing of docking, I think, is important because this was, of course, a fully utilized quarter. And therefore, could you give us an idea of when the dockings will take place in the course of the year?

So we have in Q2, we have -- well, basically, we have a docking in every quarter now. And depending on the -- I think we have in total 5 dockings this year. So we have 1 in Q2, I think 2 or 3 in Q3 and then in Q4.

So Q3 will be then a little bit burdened by the dockings. Okay. And then I have another question on the bridge financing for the 2 MPP ships, EUR 33.8 million. Do you plan to replace this bridge financing? And could you update us on this?

So we use the bridge financing, especially to being fast on the -- let's say, on being able to purchase those vessels. So the bridge financing will be substituted by a long-term traditional mortgage-backed financing. We have already looked into the market, have already offers on hand. So that is something we are working on.

So it will take place this year, I assume.

Most probably yes.

And then maybe another question on, you have 2 remaining ships where the charter runs out in the current year in Q4, a similar ship like as you have already sold, so the EF Emira and I think a smaller ship Ido. And could you update us, do you plan to renew contracts? Or could there also be another divestments?

So in general, we -- I think we have communicated this. In general, every time a ship comes open for charter, we look at both scenarios, right? That's a very fluid decision-making process because the market changes every day. We will certainly look at those ships in that matter, see to renew or see to do something else with them. I do have to say, if you look at the EF Emira that we sold last week, that she had a 2-year charter contract attached that we had fixed earlier. So it's not only the vessels that are trading with a renewal coming up that you can sell, right? So we do look at our entire fleet every day and we evaluate it every day. I hope you understand that these are quite sensitive commercial matters and that we cannot comment, and I think there was a question in the chat as well on the EF Emira, if that's the next candidate. We don't comment on that because commenting on that would be very detrimental to our commercial decision-making. But any ship that we have, we always evaluate is there somebody who's willing to pay a price that is higher than the price that we believe in? Or is it a ship that we plan with long term?

And maybe a last question on the charter rates because they went up stronger than I expected. I mean, there was not so many changes in your portfolio. I think there was, of course, the 2 MPPs and one of them came already -- was already transferred in Q1. And then I think there was a bulker, Rubina, which were now trades at SPOT. Are these the changes which drove your charter rates upwards?

Well, we have also renewed ships, right? If you compare this slide -- one second, I'll just give it out for you. If you compare this slide to the one we did last, there's more changes than just the Emira being sold. So multiple ships have been fixed and the charter rates, as we say, have developed quite nicely over the past 3 months even. And so that's the reason behind it. And just to also say, sometimes we will report a fixture, let's say, as a backlog increase in, let's say, last quarterly reporting for Q3 or Q4. And then this fixture has been done in advance, right? So for example, if there's a ship open next year, we sometimes get approached by our customers or by a third party to renew that contract already in advance. And that's the same decision-making process that we have for all ships. If we deem that price to be accretive to shareholders, then we execute. And if we don't, we don't. But then, of course, these ships only get into that new charter in a year's time.

But it's only actual charters, so the tankers are not included here.

No.

In the charter rating, yes, of course.

And then we will move on with the questions from Nikolas Demeter.

I just have a question about the guidance -- update of the guidance and the guidance range. It assumes that the EUR 11 million, which we are higher now in this guidance range, is mostly about the sale. So I just want to ask you about more detail maybe. Is it around EUR 10 million about the sale? Or is it even more? And also because we have also fixed now more charter rate, how is your opinion for the rest of the year? What can go wrong? Actually, it seems to be really visible and it seems also to be a good alignment. It feels like that we could go more to the upper half of the range. I just wanted to hear your opinion about that.

Maybe, Christopher, you take the this one, and I will say what can go wrong.

I mean, as you said, Nikolas, we are very confident looking on the revenue for the remaining of this year since the guidance is EUR 145 million to EUR 160 million, whereof already EUR 147.5 million is contracted, right? Of course, the factor which we cannot really anticipate is the development of the U.S. dollar-euro exchange, which is also one of the main reasons why we are communicating a broader range. And of course, since we sold the vessel, a certain portion of the revenue is not part of it anymore, but also on the cost side, but the main effect is on the book gain within the EBIT upgrade when it comes to the guidance. What can go wrong until end of year, contracts are in place. I do not see anything tremendously happening. But Joseph, you might have.

No. I mean, in our business model, this will increasingly be the case, right? With our new focus on long-term charters, you will increasingly see a variety of years and even several years ahead to be basically locked in at the rates that we contract because that is our communicated strategy to have multiyear cash flows. Of course, then we have staggered ships coming open over every year, and they can increase or decrease the earnings capability. This year, we do have 2 ships open, so they might have a positive or negative impact to our guidance. Euro-dollar, as Christopher said, I mean, we've been asked this question quite a lot, why we used to guide last year also in even wider ranges, why is the range so wide? Because we are a euro-listed stock and a dollar-denominated business. So that has a huge impact. And so we don't see a lot of trouble ahead. We have the dry dockings and then you might have a 5-day earlier release of the vessel or a 5-day overrun or a 10-day overrun. These things are -- these are machines that are on operation 24/7 for 5 years in a row. So there is things that can go off target. But in terms of financials, usually these things are fairly stable.

And now I have also a question about the tankers. It feels like they come quite early, like already coming at the end of 2026, beginning of 2027. So I was wondering how the capacities for building these ships are actually in the market. Is it that you have some reservation slots there or about special contacts? Or is it kind of easy to build a new?

No. So it is very similar to real estate. Sometimes you buy a plot and then you build a house yourself. And sometimes there is a project developer who you buy the finished house from. In this case or in the case of our 2 containership newbuildings, we started from scratch with our charterer and develop these ships and went to the yard and ordered them themselves, and we will build them themselves with quality partners and we'll do the entire value chain. In this instance, with the tankers, somebody was already building these ships and they are due for delivery, and we bought them with delivery when they come. So it's basically a turnkey solution. So the difference, of course, is that the building risk that you enter into -- what we have entered into in our container ships, the delay possibilities, technical risks, et cetera, in this instance, it is not with us, but with the seller. And on the container ships, we are the actual project owner. So we run the full value chain of that project. I hope that sort of explains it with the real estate.

Yes, that makes sense. And maybe one last question about nonstrategic minorities like the joint ventures in your capacities. Are there any left could be reduced? Or are these remaining joint ventures are strategic...

Most of what we have left is strategic. And nonetheless, as you see with EF Emira last week, we do steer it in a certain direction, right? So most of the ships that are left on the fleet, I'll just show you, it's maybe easier. So you see here these 3 joint ventures. The Joint Venture 1, as you see, is the largest and fairly strategic. As you see, we could develop new buildings into that. But within that joint venture, we are also trying to renew the fleet, trying to see if we can take care of good markets. And on general, joint ventures in the future of our company will play a smaller role. The Joint Venture 3 is also a strategic one where we see some value. Nonetheless, this is a bit similar to our own fleet where we assess this every day, what's the strategic value, what is possibly the value of getting out or buying our partner out as we've done last year. And this is not in this slide, but in general, from our investor presentation, you see that the value of these joint venture ships relative to the total value of our fleet and our company is getting increasingly small. So for the shareholders to understand our business, if we arrive at a, let's say, 10% share of the fleet that is in joint venture hands, it might be more valuable for the shareholders to have the strategic joint venture than it has a value to be simplified and easily to understand the cash flows, if that sort of answers your question.

Thank you so much. And then we've covered all the questions from the audio line, and we'll move over to the chat. We have a couple of questions in the chat as well. The first one is from Mr. [indiscernible]. Is there a timeline for when the uplifting to the regular market is scheduled?

Yes, that's for Christopher.

Yes. There is no exact deadline because, first of all, we have to do our homework on our side. As mentioned, we started the implementation of IFRS reporting. And before we can think of an uplifting to the regular market, we need to have 2 years of audited financial statements in place, which derives the timeline to a certain extent, but that is more or less within the next 2 to 3 years, that would be something we would like to pursue. But as of now, we cannot communicate an exact timing.

And the second question from Mr. [indiscernible] is, are further sales by the major shareholders planned?

Well, if I may take that as well. We, as the Board of Ernst Russ, of course, our strategic focus is of increasing the liquidity in the share to increase the free float. So we see that as a strategic aspect. But of course, in the end of the day, it's a decision of the major shareholder, which we cannot anticipate as of now. But of course, we would like to see that development going further.

And then we have a couple of questions from Mr. [indiscernible] His first question is concerning the market value of your fleet for clarification, is the vessel Charlie excluded and the sold vessels still included in newbuild acquisition pipeline excluded?

That is correct. Yes.

How much of the market value is attributable to minority interest? Does this include the net financial position? Can you provide the net financial position adjusted for minority interest as of 31st of March?

Yes. So when we're looking at the market value of the joint venture fleet, it is roughly USD 188 million, whereof around $92 million belongs to our joint venture partners, and the rest is the fully Ernst Russ owned fleet. So does the next question -- I can read this here in the chat. So the interest-bearing financial liabilities are fully on the Ernst Russ balance sheet. So yes. Next question. On your charter backlog, can you provide a clean figure excluding your newbuild acquisition pipeline? So it would be EUR 363 million of newbuilding acquisition pipeline.

Last short question, last short answer. And this answer concludes our call for today. And so thank you, everyone, for joining and for showing interest. It was a pleasure to be your host today. Thank you, Christopher and Joseph, for your presentation and the time you took. And for some final remarks, I would like to hand back to you, Christopher.

Thank you very much. And also from our side, once again, ladies and gentlemen, thank you very, very much for taking the time today and to your general interest in Ernst Russ AG. And we hope to have provided you with a clear picture of the first quarter strong performance results and a clear view of where we are heading for the remaining time of this year, and we look forward to continue this dialogue with you throughout this year and to, once again, see you virtually or in person in the upcoming events. And if you have further questions, which we were not able to address today, do not hesitate to reach out to us at any point in time or our Investor Relations team. So we really appreciate this open dialogue we are now establishing. So thank you, everyone, and wishing everyone a wonderful sunny day; at least in Hamburg, it's sunny. So many thanks.

Thank you. Bye.

Bye.