International Shipholding reports higher earnings

International Shipholding Corp. reported third quarter profit of $11.3 million compared $2.3 million for the same 2007 period.

The company noted the 2007 third quarter results reflected losses from the company's discontinued LASH operations. Without those losses, earnings last year would have been $3.4 million.

The Mobile-based carrier said revenue for the quarter was $66.2 million versus $51.3 million in the same 2007 period.

As expected, the carriage of supplemental cargoes on the company's U.S.-flag pure car carriers experienced improvement in the third quarter over the previous quarter. It is expected that the results from this segment of the company's business will return to historical average levels in the fourth quarter, the company said.

The company said its Central Gulf Railway ferry service which connects Mobile, Ala., with Coatzacoalcos, Mexico, continued to meet raised expectations in the third quarter, and that a coal carrier that it operates along the U.S. coastline operated more days in the third quarter of 2008 than the comparable 2007 period.

Depreciation expense was lower in the current quarter, primarily due to adjustments to increase the salvage values of the company's two container vessels and the company's U.S.-flag coal carrier.

The company noted that administrative and general expenses were higher, attributing that in part to an ongoing evaluation process of a proposal from Liberty Shipping of Lake Success, N.Y., which owns 9 percent of the company's stock and has made an acquisition offer.

The company's revealed it is taking a cautious approach to investing its funds because of the turmoil in world financial markets.

The company's average investment interest rate in the third quarter of 2008 was approximately 1.9 percent as compared to 4.5 percent for the third quarter of 2007. Given the current uncertainty in the worldwide credit markets, the company has currently invested the majority of its available cash in government backed Treasury Funds which are yielding less than 1 percent. As conditions improve, higher yielding investments will be sought, it said.