roperty is expected to be the sector hardest hit by COVID-19, as the health crisis will continue to limit demand, credit rating agency Moody’s Investors Service has forecast.
Moody’s vice president and senior credit officer, Jacintha Poh, said on Thursday that the agency projected that the aggregated earnings of property companies would decline by 40 percent in 2020.
The figure is double the agency’s overall earnings projection for all business sectors, which is expected to fall by 20 percent this year.
Property companies generating a substantial proportion of earnings from the retail and hospitality business will feel the deepest pain, Poh said.
“Companies like PT Pakuwon Jati and Lippo Malls Indonesia Retail Trust [LMIRT] will suffer the biggest decline in earnings due to mall closures and rental rebates,” she said during a webinar.
Publicly listed Pakuwon Jati manages various shopping malls and hotels in Jakarta and Surabaya, East Java, while Singapore-based LMIRT is a real estate investment trust that has invested in and manages various malls and other retail properties owned by Indonesia’s diversified conglomerate Lippo Group.
The pandemic has hit Pakuwon Jati’s revenue, which nosedived by 43.7 percent year-on-year (yoy) to Rp 1.97 trillion (US$132.3 million) in the first half of this year, while its bottom line slid by 64.6 percent yoy to Rp 482.5 billion.
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