Westshore Terminals Income Fund - Q1 Distribution Announcement

About this update from Westshore Terminals Investment Corporation

[{"type":"text","content":"\n\n\n\n\nVANCOUVER, March 21 /CNW/ - Westshore Terminals Income Fund (TSX: WTE.UN)\n(the \"Fund\") announced today that a cash distribution of $20,410,522\n(representing $0.29 per trust unit) will be paid on or before April 15, 2006\nto unitholders of record on March 31, 2006 as compared to $14,076,222\n(representing $0.20 per trust unit) for the same period in 2005. The Q1 2005\ndistribution is solely derived from the operations of Westshore Terminals\nLimited Partnership.\nFor the first quarter of 2006, Westshore anticipates that its tonnage\nthroughput will be approximately 4.2 million tonnes as compared to 5.7 million\ntonnes for the same period in 2005. This represents one of the poorest\nquarters for throughput at Westshore for several years.\nIt is more than usually difficult to assess the level and timing of\nthroughput volumes for 2006. The uncertainty is reflected in the March 20,\n2006 news release issued by Fording Canadian Coal Trust, which owns 60% of Elk\nValley Coal Partnership, Westshore's largest customer which accounted for 92%\nof the terminal's throughput by volume in 2005. Fording has indicated that the\nuncertainties are such that it can only provide a range of sale tonnages of\nbetween 22 million and 25 million tonnes for the 2006 calendar year. That\nrange of tonnages suggests that Westshore's throughput for 2006 will be in the\nrange of 18 million to 21 million tonnes.\nAs also announced in the Fording Canadian Coal Trust news release, the\nElk Valley Coal Partnership has achieved sufficient settlements to indicate\nthat its average price for coal sales in the period April 1, 2006 to March 31,\n2007 is expected to be approximately US$109. This represents a reduction of\napproximately 11% from the US dollar prices realized by Elk Valley for the\ncoal year ending March 31, 2006, which were over 100% higher than the average\nU S dollar price realized in the coal year ending March 31, 2005. (These\nprices represent sales for all products, not only those exported through\nWestshore). Coupled with the recent further rise in the value of the Canadian\ndollar relative to the US dollar, these prices indicate that Westshore's\nloading rate for tonnage shipped at a variable rate, and hence its average\nloading rate, for the 2006/07 coal year will be lower than for the 2005/06\ncoal year.\nFor 2006, tonnages shipp...

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