Mapletree Logistics Trust had a challenging 1QFY2025 for the three months ending June 30. Gross revenue for the quarter declined by 0.3% y-o-y to $181.7 million, with net property income (NPI) falling by 0.9% to $156.7 million. In a statement, the REIT manager attributed the decline to weaker performance in China, the absence of revenue from divested properties and currency depreciation of primarily the Japanese Yen and Chinese Yuan. The decline was mitigated by higher contribution from properties in Singapore and Hong Kong, as well as contribution from acquisitions completed in 1Q FY24/25 and FY23/24. On a constant currency basis, revenue and NPI would have registered growth of 2.1% and 1.3% respectively.
Distributable income was affected by higher borrowing costs which rose by 9.4% y-o-y to $38.5 million. This, coupled with lower divestment gains led to a 7.4% y-o-y decline in distributable income to $103.7 million. Distributions per unit (DPU) fell by 8.9% to 2.068 cents on an enlarged unit base.
During 1Q FY24/25, MLT completed the acquisitions from its Sponsor of three modern, Grade A assets in Malaysia and Vietnam. MLT also completed the divestments of two properties in Malaysia and Singapore for approximately $18.0 million and announced the divestments of another two properties in Singapore and China with a combined value of approximately $26.9 million. As at June 30 MLT’s portfolio comprised 188 assets with a book value of $13.4 billion.
Overall portfolio occupancy was stable at 95.7%, compared to 96.0% last quarter, while the weighted average lease expiry stood at approximately 2.9 years. The portfolio achieved positive rental reversions across MLT’s markets, ranging from 2.1% in Hong Kong SAR to 7.8% in Singapore, except for China which registered negative rental reversion of -11.3%. The overall weighted average rental reversion of leases renewed during the quarter excluding China was 4.6%, including China it was 2.6%.
The leverage ratio stood at 39.6% while the weighted average borrowing cost for 1Q FY24/25 was stable at 2.7% per annum.
