Topic: How To Invest

RIOCAN REAL ESTATE INVESTMENT TRUST $27.20 – Toronto symbol REI.UN

RIOCAN REAL ESTATE INVESTMENT TRUST $27.20 (Toronto symbol REI.UN; Units outstanding: 317.8 million; Market cap: $8.7 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Average; Dividend yield: 5.2%; www.riocan.com) is Canada’s largest real estate investment trust (REIT), with interests in 338 shopping malls containing over 92 million square feet of leasable area. That total includes 48 U.S. malls with over 13 million square feet.

In the three months ended March 31, 2015, RioCan’s revenue rose 7.7%, to $331.0 million from $307.4 million a year earlier. Cash flow per unit gained 4.8%, to $0.44 from $0.42.

The trust’s latest acquisitions increased its rental space by 1.7%. It’s also doing a good job of renewing current tenants at higher rates: rents on renewals rose 9.8% in Canada and 8.3% in the U.S.

Former tenant Target Canada recently abandoned 26 stores in RioCan’s malls. So far, RioCan has found new tenants for eight of Target’s former stores. It hopes to fill the remaining 18 over the next few months, but it will probably have to remodel them to handle two or more tenants.

The units trade at 16.2 times RioCan’s forecast 2015 cash flow of $1.68 a unit. That’s reasonable in light of the trust’s highly profitable properties and 96.7% occupancy rate. The units yield 5.2%.

RioCan is a buy.

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