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Josephine Ma

STRONG growth in rental income from its China properties lifted the interim result of Shangri-La Asia, and offset a flat performance by its Hong Kong hotel operations.

 Attributable profits increased 26.8 per cent to $367.8 million in the six months to June 30, compared with $290.12 million for the same period last year.

  Earnings per share were 33.06 cents, up 14 per cent from the previous 29.01 cents.

  Turnover increased from $694.53 million in the previous corresponding period to $860.18 million.

  An interim dividend of 15 cents will be paid.

  The results of the company, led by Robert Kuok, were at the upper end of market expectations.

  Mr Kuok is the chairman of South China Morning Post (Holdings).

 The company said occupancy for the Kowloon Shangri-La was flat at 77 per cent while that for Island Shangri-La was down four per cent to 72 per cent.

   Room rates for the Kowloon Shangri-La went up eight per cent to $1,628 and for the Island Shangri-La 11 per cent to $1,924.

   The Shangri-La Hotel Shenzhen achieved the highest occupancy growth with 25 per cent and Shangri-La Hotel Beijing achieved the highest room rate increase of 38 per cent.

  The combined profit of the China hotels increased 11 per cent over the previous corresponding period.

  The company's rental income in China, which some analysts believed to have contributed one-third of its overall profit in the first half of this year, increased substantially due to rental revision.

  The China World Trade Centre in Beijing had an occupancy rate of 92 per cent and the Shanghai Centre had a rate of 99 per cent.

  The trade centre saw an overall rental growth of 50 per cent while the Shanghai centre scored 35 per cent.

  Rohan Dalziell of Baring Securities said the result was 'pleasing'.

  He said the hotel operation in Hong Kong would see a slight recovery, especially during the peak season in the latter half of the year.

  The company said occupancies in its two hotels in Hong Kong had declined in the first four months of the year but started to recover after May.



Rental growth lifts Shangri-La