Accordia Golf Trust starts trading today

SINGAPORE'S reputation for business trust listings and Japan's ban on real estate investment trusts (Reits) holding golf course investments prompted Accordia Golf Trust (AG Trust) to head for the Republic.

But AG Trust, a business trust whose assets are golf courses in Japan, still offered some 70 per cent of its 782 million initial public offering units to investors back home in Japan, said Yoshihiko Machida, chief executive officer and executive director of Accordia Golf Trust Management. AG Trust will start trading on Singapore Exchange (SGX) today at 2pm. This is after a public offering of approximately 41 million units in Singapore at S$0.97 each, which closed on July 24. The Singapore public offering was 0.7 times subscribed.

AG Trust is sponsored by Accordia Golf, a leading golf course operator in Japan that had a 5.5 per cent market share as at March 2013. AG Trust was set up to take in Accordia Golf's assets and allow the latter to focus largely on income from golf operations.