Lendlease Global Reit achieves 4.5% premium on trading debut

Singapore

LENDLEASE Global Commercial Reit (real estate investment trust) on Wednesday ended its first day of trading on the mainboard at S$0.92, 4.5 per cent above its initial public offering (IPO) price of S$0.88.

From the start of trading at 2pm till market close, the units traded within a band of S$0.915 to S$0.945.

About 74.6 million units changed hands, making it the most heavily traded securities on the Singapore bourse for the day.

The stock opened at S$0.935, traded at an intra-day high of S$0.945, up 7.4 per cent from its initial IPO price, and reached a low of S$0.915 during the session.

A total of 1.17 billion units were issued for this IPO, which raised gross proceeds of S$1.03 billion.

The proceeds will be used for payment to the vendors for the purchase price of the initial portfolio, payment of other related acquisition costs of the initial portfolio, payment of issue and debt-related costs, and working capital.

Lendlease Global Reit had offered 387.5 million units at S$0.88 apiece. Of these, 22.7 million units were offered to the public, and valid applications for 330.4 million units were received. The subscription rate of 14.5 times was the highest for a Singapore Reit (S-Reit) in the last five years, according to the Reit's manager.

Of the 10 IPOs prior to Lendlease Global Reit this year, seven were on the Catalist board and three were Reits on the mainboard. In terms of first-day performance, Catalist-listed TrickleStar, a Malaysia-headquartered producer of energy-saving products, came up tops.

TrickleStar shares were up 30 per cent to S$0.34 compared with their IPO offer price of S$0.26 on the first day of trading.

The worst performer was Catalist-listed Reclaims Global , a manufacturing solutions and services provider, which was down by about 35.7 per cent at S$0.148 from its IPO price of S$0.23.

The other property-based SGX IPOs that made their debut this year were Prime US Reit, Eagle Hospitality Trust and ARA US Hospitality Trust.

Eagle Hospitality Trust ended its first day of trading down 6.4 per cent from its initial IPO price whereas Prime US Reit and ARA Hospitality Trust units closed unchanged.

The addition of Lendlease Global Reit on the mainboard cements SGX's position as Asia's global Reit listing hub, said Mohamed Nasser Ismail, SGX head of equity capital markets in a statement.

" S-Reits has been one of the top institutional net buy sectors in the first eight months of this year, attracting S$211 million of inflows. The sector's solid performance is an indicator of strong institutional and retail interest," he said.

Lendlease Global Reit's S$1.4 billion IPO portfolio has an aggregate net lettable area of 1.3 million sq ft, which is made up of Orchard Road mall 313@Somerset and Sky Complex, a Grade-A office property with three buildings in Milan, Italy.

The listing of Lendlease Global Reit takes the total number of SGX-listed Reits and property trusts to 45, with a combined market capitalisation of about S$110 billion, said SGX.