Africa-Press – Malawi. Property management firm, Icon Properties plc, posted an K8.7 billion profit for the year ended December 2021 representing a 0.8 percent drop from the K8.8 billion recorded in the preceding year.
This came out during the company’s annual general meeting held in Blantyre on Friday. Icon Properties Chairman Eric Chapola said the decrease in the profit was mainly due to lower revaluation gains on properties and reorganisation costs.
He said revaluation gains on properties in the year were lower than the corresponding year due to normalisation of gains following higher revaluation gains attained in the corresponding year after completion of major refurbishments.
“Stamp duty costs were paid on the transfer of properties from subsidiary companies to the parent company as part of the reorganisation and accounted for the largest cost increase. The performance continues to be led by the retail and office sectors of the portfolio which maintained occupancy levels of above 95 percent,” Chapola said.
He indicated that moving forward the company plans to build a hotel in Lilongwe and an office building in Mzuzu within the next five years. Chapola indicated that the company has funds for the two projects raised during an Initial Public Offer (IPO) it issued recently.
Despite the marginal drop in profits the company maintained a K801.6 million dividend for its shareholders similar to a dividend declared in 2020. “An interim dividend of K801.6 million representing K0.12 per share was paid in November 2021. This increased the total dividend for the year by 4.7 percent to K1.603 billion representing K0.24 per share,” the company’s annual report reads.
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