Hutchison Port Holdings Trust FY 2013 Result

2013 full year throughput of HPH Trust’s deep-water ports was 1% below last year. Combined throughput of HIT, COSCO-HIT and ACT was down by 2% year over year and YICT’s throughput was up by 1% year over year.

Revenue and other income for the full year was about the same as last year. NPAT and NPAT attributable to unitholders for the full year was 15% and 25% below last year respectively after payments of 2012 performance fee and acquisition related costs of ACT.

2013 full year Distribution Per Unit (“DPU”) is 41.00 HK cents. The Board of Directors has declared a half yearly dividend of 22.30 HK cents per ordinary share which will be payable on 28 Mar 2014.

Revenue and other income for the 4th quarter was 1% below last year. NPAT and NPAT attributable to unitholders for the 4th quarter was 34% and 47% lower than last year respectively mainly due to a couple of one-off items:
     • One-off concession to shipping lines after industrial action in HIT
     • Write off of upfront fee after US$3.6 billion bank loan refinancing
     • Exchange loss from the conversion of USD into HKD for bank loan repayment

Continued focus by HPH Trust on managing cash flow through appropriate financing arrangements, managing CAPEX spending, controlling working capital needs and optimising capital deployment with the objective of providing stable and growing annual distributions to unitholders consistent with the outlook for our business.

Based on current share value at today closing of S$0.84, HPH Trust is giving approximately 7 cents of dividend yield for FY 2013 after Sing dollar conversion which work out to be 8.33%. The dividend yield has remained attractive but one thing to note that if the share value continue to drop, the distribution will also drift lower to keep the dividend yield at 7-8%.