Pingtan Marine Reports Financial Results (China)

Business & Finance

Pingtan Marine Reports Financial Results

Pingtan Marine Enterprise Ltd.,an integrated marine services company in the People’s Republic of China (PRC), announced its unaudited financial results for the second quarter and first six months of 2013.

Pingtan’s Board of Directors received an offer from its Chairman and CEO, Mr. Xinrong Zhuo, to acquire the assets of China Dredging Group, or CDGC, and its PRC operating subsidiaries, Fujian Xinggang Port Service Co., Ltd.

The Board retained an independent financial advisor and investment banking firm, Duff & Phelps LLC, to provide a fairness opinion in connection with the proposed transaction. Mr. Zhuo has offered to purchase the CDGC business and assets in exchange for writing off the Company’s current $155.2 million promissory note (which matures on June 19, 2015 and bears an interest rate of 4%); the transfer of certain fishing trawlers to the Company (the number of which will be determined by the difference between the enterprise value of CDGC less the $155.2 million promissory note divided by the average value of each fishing trawler).

As part of the Proposed Transaction, the Board will also retain, BMI Appraisals Limited to provide an independent valuation report on the vessels that would constitute a portion of the consideration.

Duff and Phelps is currently undergoing its due diligence process and expects to deliver a fairness opinion to the Board in the coming weeks. In addition, BMI Appraisals Limited will also submit a valuation report on additional fishing trawlers.

The Company intends to provide additional information for investors, including financial metrics used by Duff and Phelps in the evaluation of the transaction and will make public all the valuation reports for vessels delivered as part of this potential transaction.

Second Quarter 2013 Management Comments

Mr. Xinrong Zhuo, Chairman and CEO of the Company, stated, “We remain focused on expanding our fishing enterprise in light of China’s increasing consumer demand. During the quarter, we negotiated a transaction to add another 46 vessels to the Company’s fleet, which will greatly increase our fish harvest volume and carrying volume, resulting in the Company having a total of 86 vessels. In addition, each of our fishing vessels require an approval from the Ministry of Agriculture of the People’s Republic of China to carry out ocean fishing projects in foreign territories. The primary barrier to entry into the ocean fishing industry has been obtaining the necessary licenses to operate these vessels because the number of such licenses is limited by government authorities so as to prevent overfishing. The newly acquired vessels are fully licensed to fish in Indonesian waters and a fishing license can be transferred to a new vessel when an old vessel retires. We believe that there are no other companies building a leading market share in the fishing industry in China like Pingtan. This is a highly-fragmented market, and we believe this market share will help in our negotiations with distributors and exporters, and also open up the possibility of selling downstream directly to end markets directly. This will increase our margins in the long-term. However, we recognize that growing our asset base is only one element of the equation, as we also must hire and train highly qualified captains and crew to successfully operate these vessels. This will be instrumental in ensuring that we continue to deliver a consistent and quality product to our customers. We feel that the Company is operating in a sustainable and growing sector and we look forward to keeping investors apprised of our progress.

About Pingtan

Pingtan is a marine enterprises group, engaging in dredging services and ocean fishing through its wholly-owned subsidiaries, China Dredging Group and Merchant Supreme, and their respective PRC operating subsidiaries, Fujian Xinggang Port Service Co., Ltd., or Fujian Service, Pingtan Xingyi Port Service Co., Ltd., or Pingtan Xingyi and Fujian Provincial Pingtan County Ocean Fishing Group Co., Ltd., or Pingtan Fishing.

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Press Release, August 13, 2013