I used to own a number of shipping trusts and lost heavily in them during the Global Financial Crisis (GFC). Like shipping trusts, Offshore Support Vessel (OSV) companies own and charter ships to other Oil & Gas (O&G) companies. Are there any lessons that shipping trusts can teach us about OSV companies? Shipping trusts buy ships and charter them out to shipping companies on long-term contracts. They provide a steady stream of revenue to service the debt used to buy the ships and pay distribution to unitholders. Initially, they started off with a small fleet of ships and low debts. However, over time, they bought more ships and took on more debt as a result. Things went on smoothly initially, until business deteriorated for the shipping companies during the GFC. Spot rates for the ships fell. Although the ships were chartered out on long-term contracts at higher charter rates than ......