Klepierre Gains as Earnings Per Share Beats Analyst Estimates: Paris Mover
Klepierre SA (LI), France’s second-largest publicly traded owner of shopping centers, reported annual earnings that beat analysts’ estimates and raised its dividend. The shares gained 3.7 percent.
Profit excluding one-time charges, known as net current cash flow, climbed to 1.99 euros ($2.64) a share from 1.96 euros a year earlier, the Paris-based company said in a statement after the market closed yesterday. Analysts expected profit of 1.895 euros a share, the average of 16 estimates in a Bloomberg survey.
Chief Executive Officer Laurent Morel forecast in July that net current cash flow would be little changed in 2011 as he sold assets to cut debt and finance a 3.3 billion-euro development program through 2016. The company plans to make 1 billion euros of disposals through 2013.
“We had a very solid activity from our shopping centers,” Morel said on a conference call in which he predicted net current cash flow per share “should increase slightly” in 2012.
Klepierre advanced 84 cents to 23.72 euros in Paris trading, giving the company a market value of 4.5 billion euros. The shares are unchanged in the three months though yesterday, compared with a 4 percent gain for the FTSE EPRA-Nareit European Index (EPRA) of real estate stocks.
Increased Dividend
The company increased its dividend to 1.45 euros a share from 1.35 euros for 2010. Shareholders may receive the payout in shares, which may boost net current cash flow per share if there is significant take-up by investors, Morel said.
BNP Paribas SA, Klepierre’s largest shareholder with a 50.5 percent stake, currently plans to take up the scrip dividend, although its final decision will be made the day before the option expires, Morel said. He declined to comment on whether BNP has plans to sell part or all of its stake.
Klepierre is stepping up disposals after raising 187.1 million euros last year. It’s tapping demand for shopping centers from investors attracted by regular rental income generated by the centers. The company plans to cut debt to 40 percent of the value of its real estate, Morel said.
Net current cash flow rose 1.8 percent to 371.1 million euros, Klepierre said. Net debt totaled 7.62 billion euros, or 45.8 percent of the value of its properties. Six months earlier, the loan-to-value was 46.5 percent.
The proceeds will also help fund projects which offer higher rental growth potential, Morel said.
Scheduled Completions
Three are scheduled to be completed this year, including a center under Paris’s Saint-Lazare railroad station, a mall in Malmo, Sweden, and the enlargement of an existing center in Claye-Souilly, near Paris.
Rents rose 1.7 percent last year, excluding the effect of disposals, openings and acquisitions, as Klepierre signed leases at higher rates, the company said. Higher management fees and the opening of its Millenaire mall in Paris and Aqua Portimao in Portugal meant total revenue rose 4.2 percent to 1.03 billion euros.
Klepierre expects rents to rise as much as 2.5 percent this year before the effect of acquisitions or new openings.
Net asset value rose 7.5 percent from six months earlier to 31.4 euros a share. Net income rose 142.2 million euros from 124.6 million euros a year earlier.
To contact the reporter on this story: Simon Packard in Paris at packard@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Andrew Blackman at ablackman@bloomberg.net.
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