Friday 29 Mar 2024
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KUALA LUMPUR (May 30): TA Enterprise Bhd's net profit for the first quarter ended March 31, 2018 (1QFY18) leaped 62.4% to RM128.61 million from RM79.18 million in 1QFY17, mainly attributable to higher contribution from its property investment, property development and hotel operations segments.

Earnings per share for the quarter expanded to 7.51 sen per share from 4.62 sen a year ago.

According to its Bursa Malaysia filing today, TA Enterprise's quarterly revenue increased more than fourfold to RM1.05 billion from RM256.53 million in the corresponding quarter last year.

TA Enterprise said the increase in contribution from its property investment was due to higher rental revenue.

For property development, it said the increase was mainly due to gain on disposal of development property located in Little Bay, Australia and the compulsory acquisition of an undeveloped land located in Petaling Jaya by the government during the quarter.

As for the hotel operations, it said the increase in net operating profit was mainly due to higher hotel occupancy, in particular, the Swissotel Merchant Court in Singapore and lower finance costs. On top of that, foreign exchange translation gain resulted from the appreciation of the US dollar against the Thai baht during the quarter has further improved the hotel operations division.

In 2018, TA Enterprise said the general prospect of most business sectors in Malaysia is expected to be more upbeat and positive following the conclusion of the 14th general election along with the promise to zero-rate the goods and services tax.

For its broking and financial services division, the uncertainty and volatility of the world's stock markets is hoped to generate greater trading volume and activities in Bursa Malaysia, which in turn will generate higher brokerage income for TA Enterprise.

"While optimising our existing resources to generate higher brokerage income, we will continue to look out for business opportunities to increase our fees-based and proprietary activities to maximise return to our shareholders," it added.

For its property divisions, TA Enterprise expects the Malaysia property market to generally be flattish in 2018 with low single-digit growth in terms of prices and moderate property sales.

"For the financial year 2018, the group may launch a few property development projects in certain strategic locations within the Klang Valley and Kuala Lumpur, to ride on the next phase of the property cycle in Malaysia. Strategic changes on products, pricing and innovative sales strategies will be adopted," it added.

At market close today, shares of TA Enterprise were down 0.5 sen or 0.81% at 61.5 sen for a market capitalisation of RM1.053 billion.

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