- Charter Hall records strong performance for first half of FY2021 despite COVID-19
- Company's investment portfolio generated a 10.9% total investment return
- Company's fund management portfolio is well-diversified
Charter Hall, one of Australia’s leading property fund managers has reported another successful six-month period for the first half of the financial year (FY2021).
Charter Hall’s Managing Director and Group CEO, David Harrison said that despite the challenges presented by COVID-19, the company have been well protected by their on-going focus on long WALE properties leased to high quality tenants.
“Our Wholesale Partnerships have had a particularly strong six months with new partnerships created with sovereign wealth fund GIC to house the Ampol portfolio, an expansion of our Aldi supermarket logistics partnership with Allianz, PGGM undertaking a new logistics partnership, and QuadReal investing in a new development project at North Quay in Brisbane.”
During the period, the company’s property investment portfolio of $2 billion generated a 10.9% total investment return. Portfolio occupancy remained strong at 97.1% and the Weighted Average Lease Expiry (WALE) improved from 8.7 to 9.1 years.
The company’s fund management portfolio, which is well-diversified across 5 sectors grew by $5.8 billion in 6 months to $46.4 billion. This growth was driven by $3.5 billion of net acquisitions, positive revaluation of $1.1 billion, and capital expenditure on developments of $1.2 billion.
The Group experienced $2.8 billion of gross equity allotment comprising $766 million in Wholesale Pooled Funds, $1.1 billion in Wholesale Partnerships, $392 million allotted in Listed Funds, and $520 million in Direct Funds.
Mr Harrison added that despite the transactional activity in the first half, the platform still enjoys $6.4 billion of investment growth capacity plus committed and uncalled equity.
“This leaves us well-positioned to continue growing via our development pipeline as well of taking advantage of strategic opportunities as they arise.”
Capital management remains a key focus with $3.7 billion of new and refinanced debt facilities during the period and no material maturities in FY21 or FY22. The company remains financially flexible, with funding capacity remaining at a substantial $6.4 billion.
