Charter Hall reports increase in FUM

Charter Hall Group has posted a 91.1 per cent jump in statutory profit after tax for the 2022 financial year to $911.1 million, up from $476.8 million a year earlier.

In its full-year results released on Thursday, Charter Hall reported operating earnings of $542.8 million, an increase of 90.9 per cent on FY21.

The firm’s funds under management (FUM) rose 52.8 per cent to $79.9 billion, including a 25.5 per cent lift in property FUM to $65.6 billion.

“FY22 delivered a record year of earnings for Charter Hall and earnings growth. The business continues to execute on its strategy of partnering with tenants and investors to drive mutually beneficial outcomes,” said Charter Hall MD and group CEO David Harrison.

“Our strong investor and tenant customer feedback evidences the customer-centric approach to partnering we continue to prosecute. Further, our ability to execute complex privatisations provides additional deployment opportunities that are not readily replicated.”

Post-balance date, the firm stated that $3.5 billion of net transactions had now taken its total FUM to $83.4 billion, including property FUM of $69.1 billion.

Over the last financial year, Charter Hall’s property investment portfolio rose $509 million to $2.9 billion, delivering a return of 23.2 per cent.

“FY22 saw us complete $8.5 billion of gross transaction value in over 90 transactions, across multiple funds and partnerships. We’ve continued to enjoy the support of fund investors with $4.7 billion of equity allotted,” said Mr Harrison.

“This year, we’ve seen strong inflows from our Direct investors, with average monthly inflows of approximately $110 million per month. As we start FY23, our investment capacity stands at $7.9 billion leaving us well placed to take advantage of opportunities that may arise.”

Highlighting its ESG leadership over the period, Charter Hall said that it had completed $2.5 billion of sustainable finance transactions linked to the environmental performance and Green Building ratings of its assets.

The firm also said that it had made strong progress towards its commitment to reach net zero by 2030 with a 54 per cent reduction in emissions from a FY17 baseline.

Distributions for FY22 totalled 40.1¢ per share, 6 per cent higher than FY21, after a final ordinary distribution of 11.27¢ and an ordinary dividend of 9.2¢ to be paid on 31 August.

For FY23, Charter Hall’s earnings guidance is for post-tax operating earnings per security of no less than 90¢ per share based on no material adverse change in current market condition.

Additionally, the firm provided distribution per security guidance of 6 per cent growth over FY22.

Jon Bragg

Jon Bragg is a journalist for Momentum Media's Investor Daily, nestegg and ifa. He enjoys writing about a wide variety of financial topics and issues and exploring the many implications they have on all aspects of life.