Property developer and investment firm Thakral has reported earnings of $2.4 million for 1HFY20 ended June 30, down 48% y-o-y. Revenue in the same period was down 15% y-o-y to $43 million, as lockdowns from Covid-19 caused business activities to slow.
The y-o-y drop in bottomline was also because of a one-off gain in the previous period from the sale of a property.
Thakral plans to keep growing its retirement housing business in Australia, on expectations that with an ageing population, demand for such properties will be resilient despite a softer economy.
The company is also confident that the value of its portfolio of commercial properties in Japan will hold up well because of low vacancy rates.
“While the tourism sector has been severely affected by the virus outbreak resulting in significantly lower hotel occupancy, there are signs that Japan is likely to emerge as one of the more attractive safe-haven investment destinations for global investors in the second half of 2020,” says chairman Natarajan Subramaniam.
The company plans to pay an interim dividend of one cent per share.
As at June 30 2020, its net asset value was 106.51 cents, up from 103.37 cents as at Dec 31 2019.
