EC World Reit to remain a going concern, in discussions with lead loan lenders for repayment
THE board of directors at EC World Real Estate Investment Trust (EC World Reit) has assessed that the trust will remain a going concern, a bourse filing on Tuesday (Nov 22) said.
The Reit manager said it is currently “in discussions” with the lead lenders of the existing offshore bank loans and existing onshore bank loans to refinance the remaining amount of the loan facilities that are maturing by Apr 30, 2023.
In June, the Reit announced the extension of the maturity date of the existing offshore bank loans to the earlier of either the earliest maturity date of the existing onshore bank loans, or Apr 30, 2023.
In connection with the extension of this maturity date, the sponsor had also provided an undertaking on May 31 to the relevant lenders of the existing offshore bank loans to procure that the exercise of refinancing of the existing offshore bank loans be commenced immediately, and to ensure that at least 25 per cent of the aggregate principal amount of these loans are repaid by the end of 2022.
The Reit manager had also on Jun 13 announced its entry into a non-binding memorandum of undertaking with Forchn International Pte Ltd (FIPL) to explore the potential divestment of certain properties – namely the Stage 1 Properties of Bei Gang Logistics and Chongxian Port Logistics.
In that announcement, the Reit had said that the lenders of the existing offshore and onshore bank loans had called on the trust to repay the mandatory repayment amount by Dec 31, due to the current macroeconomic and real estate market conditions in China.
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EC World Reit said the mandatory repayment still “remains to be the case”.
The board of directors has assessed that the Reit will remain a going concern, as it expects at this juncture that the repayment of mandatory repayment and refinancing of the remaining facilities will be completed before these borrowings become due for repayment.
The Reit manager will make further announcements on the bourse if there are “material developments which warrant disclosure”, the Reit said.
Units of EC World Reit closed on Tuesday at S$0.435 on a cum-distribution basis, down 4.4 per cent or S$0.02.
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