Perennial Real Estate seeks to wind up Capitol entities over deadlock with Pontiac Land

PERENNIAL Real Estate Holdings (PREHL) has filed applications for the Singapore High Court to wind up three associated companies related to its integrated development, Capitol Singapore at City Hall, due to a deadlock with its partner.

The three firms are Capitol Investment Holdings, Capitol Retail Management and Capitol Hotel Management.

The applications were made because "the shareholders and management of the Capitol entities are in deadlock, and that their relationship has been adversely affected such that the shareholders cannot realistically continue to work together constructively," it said in a filing to the Singapore Exchange.

PREHL said on Thursday that the shareholders were unable to agree on a number of key issues related to the project in the last few months. It did not say what these issues were.

"The prevailing state of affairs is not conducive to the business interests of the Capitol project, the Capitol entities or their respective shareholders. It is therefore necessary for the shareholders to disengage from the joint enterprise, such that the Capitol project is ultimately fully controlled by either shareholder, or by a third party buyer,'' PREHL said.

The Capitol entities together hold the assets of Capitol Singapore, an integrated development at the junction of Stamford Road and North Bridge Road.

PREHL owns an effective 50 per cent stake in each of the three Capitol entities. Its chief executive officer is retail mall veteran, Pua Seck Guan.

Chesham Properties holds the remaining 50 per cent. Chesham is a member of the Kwee family's Pontiac Land Group, a privately-held luxury property developer

All components of the integrated development - retail, theatre, hotel and residences - have received their temporary occupancy permits.

PREHL said the winding up proceedings were not expected to have any material impact on its net tangible assets or earnings per share for the current financial year ending December 31, 2016.