One of the larger investments in my non-REIT investment portfolio is in SPH. Actually, SPH is also one of my oldest investments for income.
Most of my investment in SPH is priced between $2.86 to $3.55 a share with a more recent tranche at $4.20 a share purchased in 2013 when SPH REIT was created.
Wah! $4.20 a share? Then, lost money already lah. Well, some might look at it that way.
For me, as an investor for income, assuming a DPS of 21c at the time, I was looking at a 5% dividend yield. With a much stronger balance sheet than SPH REIT, SPH made more sense to me as an investment for only a slightly lower dividend yield.
When SPH REIT was created, SPH declared a special dividend of 18c a share while retaining major ownership of both Paragon and Clementi Mall. In fact, when the counter went XD back then, I added to my investment again at $4.03 a share. (See: The mystery of the extra money in my account.)
Will SPH declare another special dividend when it sells a percentage of its stake in Seletar Mall to SPH REIT? Very likely.
Seletar Mall is 70% owned by SPH and the other 30% is owned by UE. It would probably be cleaner for SPH to take 100% ownership of Seletar Mall before injecting the asset into SPH REIT.
Of course, only time will tell how things progress but we know for a fact that SPH REIT has been granted right of first refusal on Seletar Mall by SPH.
Visiting Seletar Mall has been on my to do list for a while and, recently, I did.
I didn't see any vacant shop space and I saw a pretty good crowd on a weekday evening.
I am sure it will be a matter of time before SPH REIT is offered Seletar Mall and, as a SPH shareholder, I am looking forward to that day.
Patience will surely be rewarded.
Related post:
SPH or SPH REIT?
SPH Reit Management CEO Susan Leng said that SPH has granted a right of first refusal to the Reit, but it is only when the sponsor has decided to divest the property that the Reit can evaluate the opportunity... - Source: AsiaOne