MEGAWORLD Corp. said profit last year reached P17.9 billion, up 18 percent from the prior year’s P15.2 billion.
Revenues hit P67.3 billion, up 17 percent from P57.4 billion in 2018.
Megaworld said its leasing business posted revenues of P16.8 billion, up 18 percent from P14.3 billion the prior year.
Unit Megaworld Premier Offices contributed P10.5 billion, up 20.5 percent from P8.7 billion the prior year.
“The company was able to complete around 192,300 square meters (sq.m.) of new leasable office spaces last year. This has brought Megaworld Premier Offices’ current inventory of leasable office spaces to 1.3 million sq.m.,” the company said.
“Undoubtedly, our strongest rental business still comes from our leases of prime office spaces across the Philippines. This excludes the office spaces that we have already sold and are currently selling. The good news is that we still continue to see growth in the business process outsourcing (BPO) and information technology (IT) sectors, which comprise majority of our office rentals to date,” said Kevin Tan, Megaworld chief strategy officer.
“Also, I would like to point out the growth in the demand for office spaces outside of Metro Manila, in which we are in the best position to provide to space seekers because of our adequate office inventory in the provinces including those that are still in our pipeline,” he added.
Tan said Megaworld is continuously building more office towers, primarily to cater to the growing BPO sector, in Iloilo, Bacolod, Davao, Cebu, Cavite, Laguna, and Pampanga. In Metro Manila, the company is also building additional office developments in its various townships such as McKinley West and Uptown Bonifacio in Taguig, and Arcovia City in Pasig City.
“This remains to be a very strong sector and very sustainable, and even with the emergence of Artificial Intelligence (AI), we will also see the emergence of new companies that would require spaces,” said Tan.
Unit Megaworld Lifestyle Malls posted profit of P6.3 billion, up 14 percent from P5.5 billion in 2018.
The company said it added around 20,600 sq.m. of leasable spaces were added to the company’s retail space portfolio, bringing the total leasable space to 453,000 sq.m.
The real estate business meanwhile posted sales of P42.6 billion, up 12 percent from P38.0 billion the previous year.
The company said it posted record sales reservation last year of P149 billion.
It launched around P85 billion worth of new projects, mostly residential, and two new office projects for sale: the One Corporate Place in Maple Grove, Cavite and the International Corporate Plaza in Iloilo Business Park, Iloilo City.
Last year, Megaworld launched its 26th township, the Arden Botanical Estate located at the boundary of Trece Martires City and Tanza in Cavite, spanning across 251 hectares of raw land.
Along with its subsidiary, Empire-East Land Holdings Inc., Megaworld also launched the 24-hectare Empire East Highland City in Cainta, Rizal.
The group’s hotel business meanwhile posted revenues of P2.5 billion, up 67 percent from last year’s P1.5 billion.
“This after the company opened three new hotel properties: 93-room Hotel Lucky Chinatown in Binondo, Manila; 442-room Belmont Hotel Boracay in Boracay Newcoast, Aklan, and the 547-room Savoy Hotel Mactan in Mactan Newtown, Cebu,” it said.
“Megaworld still has the lowest financial gearing among the major listed property companies. We ended 2019 with a net debt-to-equity ratio of 26 percent, even lower than its 2018 level of 31 percent as gross debts stood unchanged during the year. This should give us more elbow room to lever up once the situation improves, likely by next year,” added Tan.
