Daily Briefing: Maritime sector stocks dominated 2017; Home prices to rebound until 2019

And here are the top three REITs of 2017.

From The Motley Fool:

The first one on the list is Mapletree Greater China Commercial Trust (SGX: RW0U), a REIT that focuses on commercial and retail real estate in China and Hong Kong. It currently has three properties in its portfolio, namely, the Festival Walk retail mall in Hong Kong, the office building Gateway Plaza in Beijing, and the business park Sandhill Plaza in Shanghai.

In the REIT’s first half of its fiscal year ending 31 March 2018 (the reporting period is from 1 April 2017 to 30 September 2017), it reported that its net property income was up 4.5% year-on-year to $142.9m. Its distribution per unit correspondingly grew 2.9% year-on-year to 3.714 cents.

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From Shares Investment via Yahoo! Finance:

2017 ended with many reasons for investors to rejoice as the Straits Times Index posted a stellar 17.9% year-to-date (YTD) return finishing at 3,402.92. Looking back at the performances of each respective sectors, Maritime, Financials and Real estate sectors topped the chart delivering remarkable double-digit gains amidst oil price recovery, a gradual US rates hike and property market rebound.

On the other hand, sectors such as Telecommunications, Consumer goods and Healthcare which are usually perceived as more defensive in nature, lost favour among investors as they lagged behind the general market registering negative returns.

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From PropertyGuru:

Analysts believe the four-year slump that has plagued Singapore’s property market may have come to an end as private home prices rose for a second consecutive quarter in the period ended-31 December.

In fact, analysts at Credit Suisse expect home prices to grow by as much as 10 percent in 2018, while OCBC Investment Research and Morgan Stanley expect an eight percent hike, reported Bloomberg.

Data from the Urban Redevelopment Authority showed that prices increased one percent in 2017 compared with a 3.1% drop in 2016.

Read more here.