ANALYSTS have been quickly upgrading their profit forecasts for Swire Pacific for last year in the light of Cathay Pacific Airways' slightly better than expected year-end results. Brokerages were last night estimating Cathay's contributions to Swire's profits to be about $80 million higher than previously tipped, but not enough to make the group's overall results exciting reading. When Swire announces its year-end results on Monday, , any strong gains from the group's real estate arm, Swire Properties, are still expected to be wiped out by lower contributions from Cathay. The consensus among analysts in the February edition of the Estimate Directory was a flat net profit of $4.4 billion, or earnings per share of $2.77 for the year. On Thursday, Cathay reported a 23.8 per cent slide in net earnings to $2.29 billion for last year. As a result, Swire's contribution from aviation last year was now expected to be less than a third of the group's total earnings. This is in stark contrast to a few years ago before the international aviation slump, when Swire's aviation interests regularly turned in at least 60 per cent of the group's total profits. In 1992, aviation accounted for 38 per cent of Swire's earnings, property an impressive 50 per cent and others including trading, hotels and shipping, 12 per cent. For last year, contributions from aviation could be as little as 30 per cent, according to S.G. Warburg Securities analyst Wong Kam-ming. With Cathay not expecting to benefit from any cyclical upturn from the worldwide aviation slump until next year, the trend looks set to continue. Lehman Brothers analyst Eisha Cheng said: ''Over the next two years, Swire can be expected to become even more of a property stock than an aviation one.'' While there have been many dour faces in Cathay's boardroom of late, it appears things could not be better at Swire Properties. With the commercial and residential rents spiralling upwards, its diverse investment property portfolio has been reaping rich rewards. Devon House in Taikoo Place, Quarry Bay, was completed in February last year and is now fully let, adding to Swire's already buoyant recurrent income. Swire Properties' profit from development properties last year was expected to be more than halved, while 1992 was an exceptional year with almost $1 billion booked from the sale of the former Swire Bottlers' site in Tsuen Wan and some shops on the Lei King Wan estate. Mr Wong estimated profits booked from development properties for 1993 could be as little as $360 million, but did not express too much concern given the strength of its property investment operations. He did not expect to see much in the way of profits from the sale of Tower Two of Robinson Place in Mid-Levels booked into Swire's 1993 profit and loss account. Other companies in the group were generally expected to show steady profit growth. In the industries division, the group's Coca-Cola operations in Hong Kong and the United States are believed to have continued performing strongly and should show healthy profit growth. Swire Technologies is also thought to have had a good year, as did its insurance and marine services divisions.
