(Alliance News) - Tritax EuroBox PLC on Tuesday reported a surge in profit due to positive trends in logistics real estate across Europe.
The London-based investor in logistics real estate across Europe reported that pretax profit in the year that ended September 30 more than doubled to EUR129.0 million from EUR53.6 million the year before.
Rental income grew 22% to EUR43.9 million from EUR36.0 million.
The company's portfolio valuation increased 53% to EUR1.3 billion from EUR837.9 million a year before.
Tritax EuroBox explained this growth was thanks to the rapid rise of e-commerce, which required companies to have large and highly automated logistics facilities.
Furthermore, supply chains issues forced businesses to acquire fewer, larger and more efficient buildings, to make the supply chain more resilient and reduce costs.
Lastly, sustainable properties with lower environmental impact and work space that promotes employee well-being drove occupational demand, according to Tritax EuroBox.
The property investor declared an interim dividend of 1.25 cents per ordinary share for the period from July 1 to September 30, up 13% from the 1.10 cents paid a year before.
The final dividend amounted to 1.10 cents, improved 10% from the 1.00 cents.
Dividends for the year as a whole, totalled 5.0 cents per share, up 13.6% from the 4.40 cents paid in the previous financial year.
Tritax EuroBox said the market is increasingly favourable, and it expects the trends driving occupier demand to continue in the long term.
The property investor concluded that it is strongly positioned to enter the new financial year and well-placed to make further progress.
"We are successfully implementing our strategy, acquiring prime assets in excellent locations, extracting value from the existing portfolio and continuing to advance our environmental, social, and governance agenda. This has helped us to deliver a strong financial performance and meaningful dividend growth. Our success this year has been underpinned by our ability to raise new equity and the issuance of our first green bond, which in turn reinforces our environmental, social, and governance strategy," Chair Robert Orr commented.
Shares were up 3.8% at 114.40 pence each on Tuesday morning in London.
By Abby Amoakuh; abbyamoakuh@alliancenews.com
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