In spite of weakness in the retail and office market, Mapletree Commercial Trust announced on 26 July that it has achieved a distribution per unit (DPU) of 2.03 Singapore cents for its 1Q FY16/17, an improvement of 1% against the 2.01 cents for 1Q FY15/16.

Gross revenue and net property income (NPI) for the quarter grew 5.2% and 3.7% year-on-year to SGD73.4 million and SGD56.3 million respectively.

The Singapore-listed retail and office REIT has attributed the growth to its focus on active asset management.

Mapletree Commercial Trust’s portfolio occupancy was at 97.8% as at 30 June 2016 with a weighted average lease expiry (WALE) by gross rental revenue of 2.5 years.

The REIT’s gearing was at 35% with weighted average all-in cost of debt at 2.73%.

On the same day, Mapletree Commercial Trust also announced that it will be offering 727,701,648 new units in the REIT via a private placement and preferential offering, to raise gross proceeds of no less than SGD1,018.8 million.

This is being done to partly fund the acquisition of Mapletree Business City (Phase 1).

The private placement will consist of an offering of 364,879,000 new units at an issue price of between SGD1.41 and SGD1.45. This is projected to raise gross proceeds of no less than SGD514.5 million.

Meanwhile the preferential offering will consist of 362,822,648 new units, and will be offered on the basis of 17 new units for every 100 existing units in the REIT at an issue price of between SGD1.39 and SGD1.43. This is projected to raise gross proceeds of no less than SGD504.3 million.

The preferential offering will open on 8 August at 9 a.m. and close on 17 August at 5 p.m. Listing of new units issued under the preferential offering has been set for 25 August at 9 a.m.

Units of Mapletree Commercial Trust finished the trading day about 1% higher from its previous close on the Singapore Exchange to end at SGD1.50.