Mall of Africa-owner is rocking

Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) Attacq reported strong results for its 2024 financial year, with its profit for the year more than doubling.

Attacq – which owns properties like Mall of Africa, Lynnwood Bridge and the Garden Route Mall – released its results for the year through June 2024 on Tuesday.

These results revealed a strong performance for the REIT, including a 7% increase in revenue to R2.60 billion.

Despite its gross property expenses increasing by over 12%, the company managed to achieve a profit for the year of R1.22 billion – a 134% increase from the previous year.

Its total comprehensive profit for the year, which includes fair value losses and foreign exchange losses from operations outside South Africa, was R1.01 billion, a 53% increase.

Its basic earnings per share increased by 83% to 135.3 cents per share, compared to the previous year’s 73.8 cents.

However, its headline earnings per share dropped by 10.9% to 72.7 cents per share, compared to 81.5 cents in 2023.

Notably, Attacq’s occupancy increased to 92.8%, and collections remained high at 100.2%.

The company’s net asset value per share increased slightly by 1.6% to 1,793 cents per share, while its total assets increased by 4.8% to R22.89 billion.

Attacq completed several key transactions in its 2024 financial year, including acquiring an additional 20% of Mall of Africa for R1.07 billion.

The company also increased its shareholding in Waterfall Junction to 50.0%, increasing its logistic development bulk to 313,791 m².

Its Waterfall City transaction with the Government Employee Pension Fund (GEPF) of R2.7 billion was successfully implemented, and R2.9 billion of the company’s debt was repaid.

The company also entered into a binding sale agreement to dispose of its Rest of Africa retail investments.

Attacq’s board declared a final gross cash dividend of 39 cents per share. This brings the full-year dividend to 69 cents per share, up from the 58 cents it paid out last year.