Market conditions have been so good for specialist real estate investor and funder St Laurence Property & Finance it will almost double last year's profit.
The Wellington-based funder said yesterday its full-year profit would be up by as much as 94 per cent.
It is predicting a post-tax profit in
the March 31 year of $30 million to $35 million but cannot yet stipulate how much will be in unrealised or paper revaluation gains. Last year's profit was $18.06 million, including $13.6 million in revaluation gains.
Chief executive John Mallon said the board was still thinking about listing on the NZX, which would allow access to further capital and liquidity.
St Laurence is listed on the secondary market, where its convertible notes trade at around $1.05. Its bonds trade on the debt exchange, NZDX.
St Laurence, wholly owned by St Laurence Holdings, which was founded in 1994, owns $1 billion in property and was established in April 2000 to buy real estate investments.
Kevin Podmore, St Laurence's chairman, and Mallon jointly issued the profit upgrade, citing "continued buoyant property market conditions".
Mallon said industrial properties were the best performers, particularly the Repco building in Mt Wellington and Central Park in Porirua.
Auckland's HP House, formerly the Ports of Auckland headquarters at the foot of Princes Wharf, was another good performer. St Laurence paid $24.75 million for the office block this year and Mallon said tenants were on a variety of lease terms, which St Laurence believed could add value to its portfolio.
Updated independent property revaluations on the group's large portfolio are expected to be confirmed in the next fortnight.
Via a management company, St Laurence also has an interest in a listed entity, National Property Trust, itself undergoing reviews of its property revaluations. National devalued its retail portfolio by $17.5 million earlier this year and a Colliers International review of those figures last week confirmed the downgrade.
Late last year, St Laurence bought National's management company for a sum said to be less than $10 million.
