Business Times: CapitaRetail China Trust’s Q2 distributable income rises 30.4%

CAPITALAND unit CapitaRetail China Trust (CRCT) yesterday said that its second-quarter distributable income rose 30.4 per cent to $10.5 million, from $8.1 million a year ago, on the back of a new acquisition.
Distribution per unit (DPU) was 1.70 cents – the same as in Q2 2007.
CRCT decided to retain $900,000 of its income available for [...]

Business Times: Keppel Land Q2 profit falls 16% to S$52.7m

Lower turnover from home sales, property services and hotels
By UMA SHANKARI
KEPPEL Land, Singapore’s third-largest developer by asset-size, said yesterday its second-quarter profit fell 16.4 per cent as it sold fewer homes in Singapore and abroad.
Net profit for the three months ended June 30, 2008 fell to S$52.7 million from S$63.0 million a year [...]

Business Times: CBRE Group income dives 88% in Q2

(NEW YORK) CB Richard Ellis Group Inc, the world’s largest commercial real estate brokerage, said quarterly net income plunged 88 per cent, partly on lower brokerage fees from sales that have all but dried up due to the severely constrained global credit markets.
Second-quarter net income fell to US$16.6 million, or 8 cents per share, from [...]

Business Times: Jones Lang Q2 profit dives 67% to US$25m

(NEW YORK) Jones Lang LaSalle Inc, the world’s second-largest commercial real estate broker, said that second-quarter profit fell 67.6 per cent as borrowing costs increased for apartment buildings, offices and retail properties.
Net income declined to US$25.5 million, or 73 US cents a share, from US$78.6 million, or US$2.32, a year earlier, the Chicago-based company said [...]

Business Times: Fortune Reit Q2 distributable income up 13.5%

FORTUNE Real Estate Investment Trust, which owns 11 Hong Kong malls, has posted distributable income of HK$79.4 million (S$13.8 million) for the second quarter ended June 30, 2008, up 13.5 per cent from the corresponding year-ago period.
The latest Q2 bottomline included HK$21.9 million non tax-exempt income, which referred mainly to interest income from fixed deposits [...]

Straits Times: JTC selling small factories to focus on bigger projects

INDUSTRIAL landlord JTC Corp aims to sell more of its small factories and other industrial space this financial year as it shifts its focus to bigger industrial developments.
In late April, JTC sold S$1.71 billion of properties to Mapletree Investments after ditching a plan to roll these assets into a real estate investment trust (Reit).
The upcoming [...]

Straits Times: No end in sight to US housing slump: IMF

WASHINGTON – THE International Monetary Fund (IMF) has said there is no end in sight to the US housing recession and warned that deteriorating credit conditions for consumers and banks may prolong a period of slow economic growth.
‘Stemming the decline in the US housing market is necessary for market stabilisation as this would help both [...]

Business Times: US obsession with owning homes has gone too far

THE real lessons of America’s housing crisis have gotten lost. It’s portrayed as the financial system run amok; the housing market became a casino. The remedy is to enact rules that prevent a repetition. All this is partly true. But it ignores a larger truth: our infatuation with homeownership, embedded in dozens of government policies, [...]

Business Times: US regulators expect more bank failures

Seven banks shut so far this year, 2 this past weekend
(WASHINGTON) US bank regulators said they expect more lenders to fail this year as the pace of shutdowns returns to more typical levels. Regulators have closed seven banks so far this year, including two this past weekend.
‘We’re in a period where we can expect an [...]

Business Times: CDL opens its first E Asia resort hotel in Phuket

Hotel arm M&C opening 2 more hotels in China and one hotel in Chennai
By ARTHUR SIM
CITY Developments Ltd (CDL) has opened the 421-room Millennium Resort Patong Phuket after pumping in 4.3 billion baht (S$175 million) to
create its first resort hotel and retail complex in East Asia.
CDL says that the hotel and retail complex [...]

Straits Times: Rents falling at most condos

New supply of homes and weak demand could mark start of downward trend
By Fiona Chan, Property Reporter
Two in every three projects with a substantial number of leases saw rents drop in the second quarter from the previous three months, according to the latest data from the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA).
This marks a reversal from [...]

Business Times: Raffles City Bahrain receives good response

80% of the 124 units launched sold within three weeks, says CapitaLand
By EMILYN YAP
CAPITALAND has reported strong demand for residential apartments within the first Raffles City-branded integrated development in the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) region.
The property group launched private sales for the Tower 2 residential block in Raffles City Bahrain about a month ago. [...]

Straits Times: Lawyer suspended 15 months for touting

WHEN lawyer Rayney Wong handed a referral fee to a private investigator posing as a property agent at a meeting four years ago, it was apparently not the first time he had done so.
Captured on video talking to who he thought was another property agent, Mr Wong claimed he had offered kickbacks to property agents [...]

CNA: Bank of China buys 30% of Swiss hedge fund, according to state media

BEIJING: Bank of China, one of the country’s big four state-owned commercial banks, has bought a 30 per cent stake in Switzerland’s Heritage Fund Management (HFM), state media reported Tuesday.
According to the agreement, the bank will eventually increase its stake to 70 per cent, while Jacques Mechelany, a founder of the Swiss asset management firm, [...]

CNA: Temasek Holdings confirms S$1.2b investment in Merrill Lynch

SINGAPORE: Singapore investment firm Temasek Holdings has pumped in an additional US$900 million (S$1.2 billion) in Merrill Lynch as part of the United States broker’s latest capital-raising effort.
Temasek Holdings said in a statement on Tuesday that it has committed US$3.4b in the public offering by Merrill Lynch.
Myrna Thomas, Managing Director, Corporate Affairs, Temasek Holdings, said: [...]