AmFirst – BT

AmFirst REIT has small fall in Q1 profit

AmFirst Real Estate Investment Trust posted a slight decline in its pre-tax profit for the first quarter ended June 30, 2011, at RM9.438 million compared with RM9.941 million in the corresponding quarter of 2010.

Its revenue declined to RM22.748 million from RM25.114 million.

Despite the challenging office market, the proactive efforts taken to actively market spaces in the past months have seen increased occupancies at particularly two of its office buildings outside the city centre, said Am ARA REIT Managers Sdn Bhd (Am ARA), the Manager of AmFirst.

The occupancies at Menara Merais and Kelana Brem Towers had improved significantly during the period reviewed to 71 per cent and 77 per cent respectively from 53 per cent and 60 per cent the previous quarter, it said in a statement.

YP Lim, Chief executive officer of Am ARA, said the company was confident of filling up more vacant spaces for both these properties.

The improved occupancy will invariably boost gross revenue as well as net income of the AmFirst, he added.

Recently, the company had also announced the proposed acquisition of Prime 9 & 10 for RM133 million with the due completion of acquisition in September this year.

Am ARA also announced that AmFirst was proposing to undertake a renounceable rights issue on the basis of three rights units for every five existing units in AmFirst.

This will increase the existing approved fund size of 429.001 million units to 686.402 million units.

The proceeds from the proposed rights issue shall be used to pare down borrowings, it said.

AmFirst is currently one of the larger commercial space REITs in Malaysia with six properties worth RM1.024 billion under its portfolio namely Bangunan AmBank Group, Menara AmBank, AmBank Group Leadership Centre, Menara Merais, Kelana Brem Towers and The Summit Subang USJ. — Bernama