Tritax Big Box is accelerating development after doubling earnings and increasing profit by 20%.
Chair Aubrey Adams said it had been “an excellent year” for the warehouse REIT, with good performance in all areas of the business leading to its strongest results to date and total accounting returns of 30.5%.
Operating profit for the year was £178m, while IFRS earnings per share rose from 26.3p to 55.4p.
Adams said the REIT now had “the financing capacity to accelerate our development programme, enabling us to capture a growing share of the unprecedented levels of occupier demand in the market”.
He added: “This demand, combined with continued constrained supply, is contributing to strong rental growth and rising capital values, reinforcing our ability to deliver further attractive total returns to shareholders over the coming years.”
The REIT’s value rose by 24% over the year from £4.41bn to £5.48bn.
Tritax said it was now accelerating its development activity, increasing its target from 2m-3m sq ft of starts to 3m-4m sq ft, with £350m-£400m of capex being poured into development. The REIT said that, despite inflationary forces and cost increases, it would maintain its 6-8% target yield on cost.
The REIT expects to complete 1.3m sq ft this year, with 3.7m sq ft starting on site in 2022. A total of 8.8m sq ft, delivering rent of between £60m and £70m, will be developed over the next two years.
As at year end, Tritax’s future development pipeline comprised 1,370 acres, with the potential to support 28.5m sq ft of logistics development.
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