Office landlord CapitaCommercial Trust (CCT) said today that its distribution per unit (DPU) for the third quarter came in at 1.99 Singapore cents, 7.6 per cent higher than the 1.85 cents declared the same period a year ago.
This brings CCT’s year to date DPU to 5.89 cents, 13.7 per cent more than the 5.18 cents DPU announced for the same period last year.
According to analysts, the growth in CCT’s distribution is a sign that Singapore’s commercial property market, badly hit by the 2008 global financial crisis, is recovering. In the central business district, core office occupancy is now more than 95 per cent. Rentals are also firming up even as newly created office space is getting absorbed.
For the third quarter, CCT’s distributable income rose by 7.9 per cent to S$56.2 million.
However, net property income for the July to September period fell one per cent to S$76.2 million. Gross revenue declined 4.7 per cent in the quarter from a year earlier. CCT also divested Starhub Centre last month, forgoing rental income from the property.
CapitaCommercial Trust CEO Lynette Leong said it is benefiting from the steady rental recovery of Singapore’s office market post-global financial crisis, as tenants in the financial services and business consultancy sectors renew their leases. According to her, committed leases will help CCT achieve at least 98 per cent of last year’s gross rental income by the end of 2010.
She adds that the Trust has signed and renewed about 560,000 square feet of leases for the first nine months of this year. These include tenants such as Robert Walters Singapore, Orix Investment & Management and Ai Mien Bar Holdings.
Source : Channel NewsAsia – 21 Oct 2010