Filinvest REIT posts P1.9-B profit

Filinvest REIT Corp. (FILRT), the real estate investment trust of the Filinvest group, reported a net income of P1.9 billion in 2021.

In a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange, the firm said this was achieved on the back of rental and other revenues that reached P3.4 billion and a gain on derecognition of lease liabilities of P189 million.

On the back of this performance, FILRT distributed three quarterly cash dividends to date totaling P0.336 per share.

This is equivalent to an annualized dividend yield of 6.4 percent which is higher than benchmark rates and better than the 6.3 percent dividend yield it projected for 2021 in its REIT Plan and based on its initial public offering (IPO) price of P7.00 per share in August last year.

“We are pleased with our performance despite the challenges of a globally changing workplace environment,” said FILRT President and Chief Executive Officer Maricel Brion-Lirio.

She added that, “We are optimistic of a strong economic recovery in 2022, particularly in the business process outsourcing (BPO) industry, which comprises about 91 percent of our tenant base.”

FILRT has been resilient throughout the COVID-19 pandemic as BPO companies remained operational, albeit not 100 percent, even during periods of the tightest lockdowns.

The government’s recent move to transition the Information Technology and Business Process Management (IT-BPM) sector to on-site office operations by Apr. 1, 2022 is expected to boost the office leasing segment as BPOs rebuild their on-site footprint.

FILRT’s portfolio consists of 17 Grade A office buildings totaling over 300,000 square meters of gross leasable area (GLA).

Of these, 16 of the 17 buildings are in Northgate Cyberzone in Filinvest City in Alabang, a PEZA Special Economic Zone and IT park while another building is located in the gateway of Cebu IT park in Lahug, Cebu City.

The assets were valued by an independent appraisal company at P48.5 billion.

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The article was originally published in Manila Bulletin and written by James A. Loyola.