Filinvest REIT posts P1.9 billion profit in 2021

MANILA, Philippines — Filinvest REIT Corp., the real estate investment trust (REIT) of the Filinvest Group, reported a net income of P1.9 billion last year as rental and other revenues reached P3.4 billion.

Filinvest REIT president and chief executive officer Maricel Brion-Lirio said the company performed well despite the challenges.

“We are optimistic of a strong economic recovery in 2022, particularly in the business process outsourcing (BPO) industry, which comprises about 91 percent of our tenant base,” Brion-Lirio said.

She said Filinvest REIT has been resilient throughout the pandemic as BPO companies remained operational, albeit not 100 percent, even during periods of the tightest lockdowns.

The company welcomed the government’s recent move to transition the information technology and business process management (IT-BPM) sector to on-site office operations by April 1.

This, Filinvest REIT said, is expected to boost the office leasing segment as BPOs rebuild their on-site footprint.

The company’s portfolio consists of 17 Grade A office buildings totaling over 300,000 square meters of gross leasable area. Of these, 16 of the 17 buildings are in Northgate Cyberzone in Filinvest City in Alabang, a PEZA Special Economic Zone and IT park while another building is located in the gateway of Cebu IT park in Lahug, Cebu City. The assets were valued by an independent appraisal company at P48.5 billion.

Following the strong performance of Filinvest REIT, the company has distributed three quarterly cash dividends to date totaling P0.336 per share.

This is equivalent to an annualized dividend yield of 6.4 percent which is higher than benchmark rates and better than the 6.3 percent dividend yield it projected for 2021 in its REIT plan and based on its initial public offering (IPO) price of P7.00 per share in August last year.