Golar LNG acquires full ownership of Seatrium FLNG facility in $90 million deal
Golar LNG has acquired Seatrium’s and Black & Veatch’s minority ownership interests in the FLNG Hilli. The acquisitions comprise all third-party interests in the asset, including a total of 5.45% common units, 10.9% Series A shares and 10.9% Series B shares. The transaction is equivalent to ~8% of the full FLNG capacity. The total consideration for the acquisitions is $90.2 million, of which $59.9m is in equity and $30.3 million is a pro-rata share in the existing FLNG Hilli debt facility. The full economic interest of the increased ownership in FLNG Hilli will be effective from 1st of January 2025.
The FLNG Hilli is currently contracted to Perenco in Cameroon, until contract expiry in July 2026. The asset is then intended to relocate to Argentina to start a 20-year contract for Southern Energy, a consortium of leading natural gas producers in Argentina. The Southern Energy contract remains subject to defined conditions precedent, including an export license, environmental assessment and Final Investment Decision by Southern Energy.
Since her contract start-up in 2018 the FLNG Hilli has demonstrated market leading operational uptime for FLNGs globally. The asset has delivered 124 LNG cargoes and offloaded more than 8.5 million tons of LNG.
In addition, Seatrium and Golar have agreed to resolve other remaining open items, resulting in a $7 million payment by Golar to Seatrium in relation to a Hilli Train 3 utilization bonus and settlement of historical work related to former Golar owned LNGC, the Golar Gandria. Following these resolutions there are no outstanding contractual arrangements between Seatrium and Golar related to existing assets.
Golar CEO Karl-Fredrik Staubo commented: “Golar is pleased to take full ownership of FLNG Hilli. The increased ownership will give immediate cash flow accretion and is expected to add approximately $0.5bn of Adjusted EBITDA backlog1. We would like to thank our long-term partners Seatrium and Black &Veatch as co-investors and we look forward to continue to work with both organizations in our ongoing and future FLNG growth ambitions.”
(1) Adjusted EBITDA backlog: This is a non-U.S. GAAP financial measure. In the context of this press release it represents the Seatrium and Black & Veatch share of FLNG Hilli’s estimated contracted fee income for the assets current contract together with a future contract that is subject to a Final Investment Decision, less forecast operating expenses for these contracts. Adjusted EBITDA backlog should not be considered as an alternative to net income/(loss) or any other measure of our financial performance calculated in accordance with U.S. GAAP.
