JP Morgan has forecast that Great Portland Estates (GPE) will make a £16.3m pretax profit in the six months to the end of September, when it unveils its interim report on Thursday.
JP Morgan forecast an NAV per share of 273p, based on an overall portfolio valuation decline of 4%. It also forecasts that GPE’s six-month valuation performance will fall by 5.5% in the City office portfolio and by 4% in the West End.
JP Morgan analyst Andrew Penny said: “Our profit before tax forecast of £16.3m compares to a loss at the first half of 2003 of £35m.
“The latter was due to an exceptional charge of £66m from buying in a £130m debenture.
“We forecast adjusted earnings per share, excluding exceptionals and FRS 3 profits from the sales of investment properties, will have declined from 6.6p to 5.6p. This is mainly due to the dilutive impact of property sales.”
Penny said: “We expect the group to confirm that tenant demand has improved in the West End, where the company’s void rate is low at around 3%.
“We expect that the company will be more cautious about the outlook for the City, where the portfolio weighting was 24% at the year end.”
References: EGi News 14/11/03
