FLI’s Q2 profit down 23%

The 244-hectare Filinvest City

Gotianun-led Filinvest Land Inc. booked a 24 percent year-on-year decline in first semester net profit to P2.42 billion as the coronavirus (COVID19) pandemic-induced lockdown of Metro Manila and other key regions hampered operations and delayed construction activities.

For the second quarter alone, net profit amounted to about P1 billion, down by about 23 percent year-on-year, based on FLI’s regulatory filing.

“The second quarter was a most difficult time for the company with ECQ (enhanced community quarantine) limiting the operations of our malls and construction restrictions affecting residential revenue recognition. Despite the challenges, we prioritized easing the burden of our customers by providing payment grace periods or rental relief. Our past efforts in process improvement and digitalization allowed us to operate efficiently and effectively during this period as we continued to serve our customers,” said FLI president and chief executive officer Josephine Gotianun-Yap.

“We saw a very healthy rebound of sales during the GCQ (general community quarantine) period. We look forward to a gradual recovery as we expect buyer amortization payments to normalize and construction capacities to increase which will improve our residential revenue recognition in the next quarters. Operations have adjusted to the COVID-19 pandemic, from our digital marketing and online selling processes to the continued communication with our buyers and homeowners through the online service desk,” added Yap.

In the first six months, FLI reported a 30 percent decline in gross revenues to P8.81 billion.

Rental revenues slightly increased by 1 percent to P3.42 billion in the first half, with the growth in office leasing offsetting the decline in retail mall revenues.

FLI’s office buildings continued to enjoy high occupancy rates and remained operational during the ECQ period. However, most parts of FLI’s malls were closed for the duration of the ECQ, with the exception of essential services such as supermarkets, drugstores and banks.

Following government’s mandate and as support to its tenants, FLI waived rent for establishments which were not operational during the ECQ period.

As Metro Manila and other cities transitioned to GCQ from June to August 3, FLI malls were 60 percent operational as more establishments were allowed to open.

Six-month real estate sales revenues went down by 46 percent year-on-year to P4.56 billion, resulting from lower sales take-up coupled with revenue recognition delay brought about by the construction restrictions during the quarantine period.

FLI also granted a grace period in homebuyers’ payments as support to its customers during the ECQ, which affected real estate sales recognition. There were no residential projects launched in the second quarter, but the company plans to launch P11.3 billion worth of residential projects for the rest of the year.