Continental Holdings Corp (CHC, 欣陸投控) yesterday said it is looking at further business improvement this year, thanks to ample contracts and projects on hand, after achieving double-digit percentage growth in profit and revenue last year.
Consolidated revenue last year expanded 23.8 percent year-on-year to NT$26.84 billion (US$937.64 million), while net profit picked up 18.7 percent to NT$1.8 billion, with contributions from all three business segments: Continental Engineering Corp (大陸工程), Continental Development Corp (CDC, 大陸建設) and HDEC Corp (欣達環工), it said.
The results translated into earnings of NT$2.22 per share. The Taipei-based group has proposed distributing a cash dividend of NT$1.68 per share from last year’s earnings, suggesting a record payout ratio of 76 percent. The payout scheme needs to be approved at a shareholders’ meeting scheduled for June 9.
CHC has a high level of backlog, which would supply growth momentum for this year and beyond, chief executive officer Cindy Chang (張方欣) told an online investors’ conference.
As of December last year, the backlog in the engineering arm amounted to NT$74 billion, 4.3 times the revenue for last year, company data showed.
Contracts on hand for the company’s environmental project development and water treatment business totaled NT$38.1 billion, about 10.8 times the revenue for last year, the group said.
The real-estate development wing, the main source of income, is to book more profit from delivering upscale apartments in Taipei’s Zhongshan District (中山), it said.
The developer last quarter recognized only 30 percent of the profits from the complex in Zhongshan, Chang said, adding that it would start to recognize profit from another housing project in New Taipei City’s Sindian District (新店) in the second half of this year.
The project in Sindian might generate NT$2.84 billion in sales, Chang said.
The developer is due to book earnings from three more projects in Taipei and Kaohsiung next year, and is looking to complete the construction of pre-sale projects in Taiwan and Malaysia in 2025, Chang said.
The company has revised up revenue contributions from a pre-sale project in Taipei by 2.6 percent and another project in Taichung by 14.6 percent to reflect actual sales figures, Chang said.
A joint effort with the Ambassador Hotel Kaohsiung (高雄國賓大飯店) to regenerate the old property might start to make profit contributions in 2028, CHC said.
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