City Developments 01 (May 09 - Oct 16)

[LenaHuat]

Aberdeen Asset Mgt has dramatically raised its stake in CDL from 5.1783% TO 8.9103% (see SGX announcement on 7 May 2008)...........hmm..........wonder if KLB joined Mr Goh Chok Tong's delegation to Libya???

[kennynah]

14 May 2008 10:20 GMT


Singapore's City Developments Q1 net profit soars 30.8 pct on strong home sales
SINGAPORE (Thomson Financial) - City Developments, a Singapore-based property developer, said Wednesday its net profit rose 31 percent to S$165 million in the first quarter, boosted by strong contributions from its residential property projects, hotels and office buildings.

Sales, however, slipped 1.3 percent to S$758.8 million. The company said its share of sales of residential projects developed by joint venture companies is not reflected in the group sales figures, although the contributions are booked as profits.

Residential property market activities are expected to remain subdued in the near-term because of prevailing uncertainties caused by the subprime crisis and the U.S. economic slowdown, City Developments said in a statement.

The group has held back the planned sale of new residential projects until market sentiment improves, it said.

"With profits yet to be recognized from residential developments sold over the last three years which are still in the course of construction, the group is confident of remaining profitable during the next 12 months, even if it decides to continue to hold back or pace its property launches," it added.

Contributions from the group's hotel and office properties are expected to remain strong and should help offset weaker earnings from residential properties, the company said.

[winston]

Aberdeen Asset Management Asia Ltd increased its stake in City Developments Limited from 7.7957% to 8.0525%.

[LenaHuat]

M*C sold Seoul Hotel for SGD767m (purchase price was SGD417m in 1999).
Mr Kwek Leng Beng couldn't hold back his glee when he commented : "The price is VERY good. I could not refuse."..............Yo, can't possibly walk away from this offer.

Now M*C is hopping in Japan and KLB said : "It's still early days". One year into credit crunch and it's still early days. Wow, if the big fishes say so.........must be so??

[LenaHuat]

CDL's pricing of Livia caught many developers by surprise. But it was shrewd play. It bought many parcels of land in the Pasir Ris region at Ah Mah's prices umpteenth years ago. It seems that CDL retains the revisionary title to the 99-leasehold condo.

Yesterday, had lunch at the PuTien restaurant at Kitchener Road and note that the City Residence condo is almost ready for TOL. Recall that CDL bought this Gay-World property also at least 25 years from the Shaw Brothers most likely at ridiculously low prices.

CDL is a smooth and shrewd operator. Always a fav in my l/t portfolio.

[winston]

Not vested.

Singapore Hot Stocks-CityDev falls on Goldman sell call

SINGAPORE, July 28 (Reuters) - Shares of City Developments fell as much as 3.3 percent after Goldman Sachs recommended investors "sell" the stock because of the difficult operating environment for Singapore residential developers.

Singapore's No. 2 developer, City Developments, dipped to a low of S$11.12 with almost two million shares changing hands.

The broker also cut its price target by 4.5 percent to S$10.50 from S$11.

Goldman Sachs analyst Leslie Yee said City Developments's share price out-performance relative to its peers is unwarranted as it is the most leveraged to the high-end Singapore residential property sector, the segment with the most downside risk.

"We see SG residential developers facing a double whammy of weakening demand amidst incremental negatives on the economic front and rising construction costs," said Yee in a research note.

[LenaHuat]

Luckily loaded CDL instead of CapitaLand and more luckily didn't take up GS's analysis.

July 29, 2008 – Millennium & Copthorne Hotels plc (M&C) will celebrate its newest hotel opening
in Phuket on 29 July 2008. The 421-room Millennium Resort Patong Phuket joins M&C’s growing
number of new hotel openings this year.

The resort hotel is the first to be opened by an international hotel group in Phuket since the
devastating tsunami in 2004. It is also the first property opened by a Singapore-owned hotel group in Phuket in recent years.

London-listed M&C, in which Hong Leong Group Singapore has a majority stake through its
property arm City Developments Ltd (CDL), is Singapore’s largest hotel group with a portfolio of more than 110 hotels in 18 countries with nearly 35,0000 rooms.
....................
The opening of the Phuket property is the latest in a stream of hotel openings by M&C in
Asia and the Middle East. These include the Copthorne Hotel Qingdao (May), Grand Millennium Beijing(April), Millennium Harbourview Hotel Xiamen (January), the Grand Millennium SukhumvitBangkok (November 2007) and the Grand Millennium Kuala Lumpur (September 2007).

Scheduled to open in late 2008 or early 2009 are two more hotels in China - Millennium Wuxi and Millennium Chengdu.

In April, M&C also announced a joint venture with Indian group Rakindo to build 20 to 30 branded hip business class hotels in India, the first of which will open in 2009 in Chennai.

M&C will also open a hotel under this business class hotel brand in Singapore’s trendy
dining and nightspot area of Mohamed Sultan Road in 2009.

In the Middle East, M&C recently opened two new properties in Dubai and one in Kuwait under management contracts, and announced the signing of a further seven management contracts in the United Arab Emirates and one in Dubai.

[iam802]

Beautiful.

I like the way they describe CDL... (Singapore largest hotel group...fantastic!)

Congrats on the great move!

[LenaHuat]

Hi iam802
Join me

[LenaHuat]

2day, M&C announced 2Q and so first half 2008 results:

First half


· Revenue growth of 2.2% to £338.4m; Hotel revenue growth of 4.9% to £334.5m
· Group RevPAR# up by 6.0% to £54.91; Group RevPAR# up by 8.3% to £54.91
· Hotel gross operating profit up 9.8% to £126.0m (2007: £114.8m) and gross operating margin improved 0.8 percentage points to 37.7% (2007: 36.9%)
· Property operations recorded a loss of £0.2m compared with a £4.5m profit in 2007
· Headline operating profit up 6.1% to £67.6m (2007: £63.7m) ²
· Profit before tax up 9.2% to £60.3m; Headline profit before tax up 9.2% to £58.4m (2007: £53.5m) ²
· Basic earnings per share down 24.4% to 13.6p (2007: 18.0p); Headline earnings per share up 13.2% to 12.9p (2007:11.4p)3
· Interim dividend of 2.08p maintained
· Interest cover was 13.7 times, with gearing down to 17.7% from 18.3%
· Opened three hotels in China and four hotels in the Middle East

Commenting today, Mr Kwek Leng Beng, Chairman said:
“Our half year 2008 results are in line with the Board’s expectations. Excluding property operations in Australasia where there is a slowdown in general market conditions, the Group profit before tax increased by 17.1%.
Within the hotel operations, strong performance in Singapore, New York and London was offset by slower growth in Regional UK and New Zealand and the impact of refurbishing our hotels in Boston and Chicago.
In particular, Singapore has experienced healthy growth with a RevPAR increase of 33.3% over last year. Going forward, we note that the rate of growth has slowed in Asia in June and July 2008. In this uncertain economic environment, it is imperative that the Group remains ever more vigilant in controlling costs and be able to react quickly to the changing market conditions. Meanwhile, the RevPAR growth trend of the second quarter has continued into the third quarter with RevPAR up by 6.7% in the month of July.”