Ascendas REIT completes China exit

Singapore and Australia are its new focus.

Ascendas REIT (A-REIT) announced that it has entered into a Sale and Purchase agreement with two indirect wholly-owned subsidiaries of China Vanke for the divestment of its A-REIT City@Jinqiao business park property in Shanghai for an attributable property value of $221.6m.

According to OCBC Investment Research, this is A-REIT’s last remaining property in China following the divestment its two other China properties this year.

The attributable property value of S$221.6m is approximately 1.8x of the original property value of S$122.3m when it was acquired in 2013, and is also 8.6% above the property’s book value of S$204.0m, as of the end of March.

"Given its proposed divestment of its last property in China, we now expect A-REIT to focus on expanding its footprint in Singapore and Australia," OCBC stated.