The value of Picton’s portfolio fell 1.2% to £757m in the six-month period to 30 September.
The company posted EPRA earnings of £10m (1.8p per share) and a like-for-like increase in reported rent of 0.4%.
The company said that during the reporting period it had continued its alternative use strategy to reduce its exposure to the office market and had sold an office asset in Cardiff for student accommodation subject to planning. It also secured planning consent at Angel Gate in London to convert more than 30,000 sq ft of office space to residential.
Michael Morris (pictured), chief executive of Picton, said: “Picton has once again outperformed the MSCI UK Quarterly Property Index. We continue to operate with a covered dividend and have a robust balance sheet comprising predominantly long-term fixed rate debt.
“Our exposure to the better performing industrial sector has supported the overall portfolio valuation while we’ve made excellent progress with our plans to find alternative uses for some of our office assets. We’re also continuing to progress a number of asset management initiatives aimed at capturing the reversionary potential in the portfolio. We have scope to grow annual rental income by letting £5.9m of vacant space and by resetting rents to market levels providing a further £2.8m per annum.”
Last week, it was revealed Picton and UK Commercial Property REIT (UKCM) were in talks regarding a possible all-share merger of the two companies on an EPRA NTA for EPRA NTA basis.
