Rent collection, Dividend Declaration and NAV

RNS Number : 5417H

Alternative Income REIT PLC

04 August 2021

 

4 August 2021

Alternative Income REIT P lc

(the " Company " or " Group ")

RENT COLLECTION, DIVIDEND DECLARATION, NAV AND BUSINESS UPDATE

The Board of Directors of Alternative Income REIT Plc (ticker: AIRE), the owner of a diversified portfolio of UK commercial property assets, predominantly let on long leases, provides a trading and business update and declares an interim dividend for the quarter ended 30 June 2021 .

Rent collection

The current quarter's rents are split 80% quarterly and 20% monthly and, to date, the Group has collected 85.9% of the total due for the current quarter. From those tenants paying monthly, collections represent 98.2% of the amount due to date. Collection of the remaining 1.8% has been delayed pending asset management activity at two of the Group's properties.

Dividend declaration and Earnings per Share

The Board declares today an interim dividend of 1.64 pence per share for the quarter ended 30 June 2021 (quarter ended 31 March 2021: 1.25 pence per share). The dividend   will be a Property Income Distribution and paid on 31 August 2021 to shareholders on the register on 13 August 2021. The ex-dividend date will be 12 August 2021.  

In aggregate, dividends of 5.14 pence per share have been declared in respect of the year ended 30 June 2021, (year ended 30 June 2020: 5.00 pence per share). For the year ended 30 June 2021, unaudited earnings per share were 6.92 pence per share. Unaudited EPRA earnings per share ("EPRA EPS") were 5.55 pence per share with dividend cover of 108% (year ended 30 June 2020: losses of 6.27 and 5.42 pence per share respectively). T he EPRA EPS includes accruals to reflect the minimum contracted uplifts, the amortisation of loan arrangement fees and movements in the provision for impairment of trade receivables , excluding these items from the Group's EPRA EPS, for the year ended 30 June 2021, unaudited adjusted cash earnings were 5.07 pence per share with dividend cover of 99% (year ended 30 June 2020: 4.25 pence per share; dividend cover of 85%).

Unaudited earnings per share and EPRA EPS for the quarter ended 30 June 2021 were 1.70 pence and 1.09 pence per share respectively (quarter to 31 March 2021: 1. 46 pence and 1.56 pence per share respectively). The unaudited adjusted cash earnings for the quarter ended 30 June 2021 were 0.98 pence per share (quarter ended 31 March 2021 : 1.43 pence per share).

Property Valuation

At 30 June 2021, the independent fair valuation undertaken by Knight Frank of the Company's property portfolio was £109.23 million (31 March 2021: £108.73 million). The net initial yield on the Company's portfolio was 5.93% (31 March 2021: 5.94%).

Net Asset Value

At 30 June 2021, the Company's unaudited net asset value ("NAV " ) was £ 68.89 million, 85.58 pence per share, (at 31 March 2021: £68.53 million, 85.13 pence per share). See the table below for the movement in NAV during the quarter.

Analysis of Movement in NAV

Movement during the quarter	Pence per share	£ million
NAV at 31 March 2021	85.13	68.53
Valuation movement in property portfolio*	0.61	0.49
Income earned for the period	2.36	1.90
Expenses for the period	(0.83)	(0.67)
Net finance costs for the period	(0.44)	(0.36)
Interim dividend paid during the quarter ended 30 June 2021	(1.25)	(1.00)
NAV at 30 June 2021	85.58	68.89

*  The net valuation increase of £0.49 million includes the movement in the independent property valuation, allowance for the minimum contracted rental uplifts and direct property costs .

The NAV attributable to the ordinary shares has been calculated under International Financial Reporting Standards as adopted by the United Kingdom and incorporates the Group's properties valued individually on a 'Red Book' valuation basis as at 30 June 2021 and the net income for the quarter, but does not include a provision for the interim dividend declared today (see above) for the quarter ended 30 June 2021.

The income earned for the period includes an accrual for the minimum contractual uplifts contained in the index linked leases. In the event that inflation is greater than these minimum contractual uplifts, the actual income will be greater than the income currently accrued.

Portfolio update

The Group remains fully invested, with a diversified portfolio of UK commercial property assets that are currently fully let, with a w eighted average unexpired lease term of 17.79 years (31 March 2021: 18.04 years) to the earlier of break and expiry and 19.81 years (31 March 2021: 20.06 years) to expiry.

87% of the portfolio's income stream is reviewed periodically, on an upward only basis, in line with inflation; with 65% and 22% of the portfolio indexed (subject to floors and caps) to RPI and CPI respectively.

Alan Sippetts, Non-Executive Chairman of Alternative Income REIT plc, comments:

" The Board is pleased to declare today an increased dividend to shareholders, underlining the continuing strength of the Group's collection of rent from our 100% let portfolio. Taken together with our robust balance sheet, modest overhead and with 87% of our portfolio's leases with inflation linked upwards only rent reviews, the Board remains confident that the Group will provide attractive total returns to our shareholders principally in the form of fully covered dividends. "

ENQUIRIES

Alternative Income REIT PLC
Alan Sippetts - Chairman	via Maitland/AMO below
M7 Real Estate Ltd Richard Croft	[phone]
Panmure Gordon (UK) Limited	[phone]
Alex Collins
Tom Scrivens
Chloe Ponsonby
Maitland/AMO (Communications Adviser)	[phone]
James Benjamin	[e-mail]

The Company's LEI is 213800MPBIJS12Q88F71.

Further information on Alternative Income REIT plc is available at www.alternativeincomereit.com ¹ .

NOTES

Alternative Income REIT PLC aims to generate a sustainable, secure and attractive income return for shareholders from a diversified portfolio of UK property investments, predominately in alternative and specialist sectors. As noted above, the majority of the assets in the Group's portfolio are let on long leases which contain inflation linked rent review provisions.

The Company's investment adviser is M7 Real Estate Limited ("M7"). M7 is a leading specialist in the pan-European, regional, multi-tenanted real estate market. Majority owned by its senior managers, it has over 220 employees in 15 countries across Europe. The team manages over 570 properties with a value of circa €3.9 billion.

1  Neither the content of the Company's website, nor the content on any website accessible from hyperlinks on its website or any other website, is incorporated into, or forms part of, this announcement nor, unless previously published on a Regulatory Information Service, should any such content be relied upon in reaching a decision as to whether or not to acquire, continue to hold, or dispose of, securities in the Company.

 

END

 

 

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