Singapore-listed industrial REIT, Mapletree Logistics Trust, announced on 29 April that it has achieved a distribution per unit (DPU) of 1.80 Singapore cents for its 4Q FY15/16, a decrease of 2.7% over the 1.85 cents paid in the same period for the last financial year.
Distributable income for the period slipped by 2.4% to SGD44.78 million. However gross revenue and net property income (NPI) for the period came in 4.4% and 3.3% higher at SGD88.45 million and SGD72.64 million respectively.
“The improvement was mainly driven by contributions from acquisitions and strong results from Hong Kong, but partly offset by weaker performance from Singapore, and lower translated results from Malaysia due to the depreciation of the MYR”, said the REIT.
DPU for FY15/16 was 7.38 cents, an decline of 1.6% from the 7.5 cents paid in FY14/15.
“FY15/16 was a challenging year”, said Ng Kiat, CEO of the REIT’s manager. “We faced significant headwinds in Singapore due to the conversions of single user assets to multi-tenanted buildings amidst rising supply of warehouse space”, she said.
“The global economic slowdown also contributed to a difficult leasing environment. Nonetheless, through active asset and lease management, we have maintained a healthy portfolio occupancy rate of 96.2% and a well-staggered lease expiry profile with a WALE of 4.5 years”, she added. Mapletree Logistics Trust portfolio occupancy in the corresponding period a year ago was 96.7%.
The REIT’s aggregate leverage ratio as at 31 March 2016 was at 39.6%, up from 34.3% in the previous year. Weighted annualised interest rate was 2.3%, up slightly from the 2.1% recorded at 31 March 2015.
The REIT has indicated that it expects the year ahead to remain challenging. “The softening economic environment will likely exert pressure on rental rates although demand for modern, well-located warehouse space is expected to remain stable”, it added.
Units of Mapletree Logistics Trust finished the trading day about 0.5% higher from its previous close on the Singapore Exchange to finish at SGD1.08.