PETALING JAYA, Oct 2 -- Sunway REIT Management Sdn Bhd, the manager of Sunway Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT), is targeting to grow its property value to RM15 billion in the financial year ending June 30, 2025 (FY25) under its Transcend 2025 (TC25) initiative.

Its chief executive officer, Datuk Jeffrey Ng Tiong Lip said currently Sunway REIT's property value stood at RM8.05 billion, which is managed through 17 assets.

"The target (to grow property value) will be achieve through deployment of multi-faceted strategies, including geographical diversification within and outside of the country," he told a media briefing on the company's strategies moving forward here, today.

Declining to reveal any details on the diversification, Ng said the company is still studying all overseas markets to ensure it makes correct choices in terms of market penetration that promise good returns to the company and its shareholders.

TC25 is a programme that formulates a strategic roadmap to capitalise on the diversity of Sunway REIT, leveraging its strategic pillars to set mid-term goals and aspirations up to FY25.

Aspired to be a leading diversified REIT in Malaysia under the initiative, Ng said TC25 is also looking to capitalise on global megatrends to expand investment into emerging growth sub-sectors, such as e-commerce, to diversify its asset protfolio.

The initiative also looks into opportunity-led acquisition, redevelopment, turnaround and divestment, as well as explores development and built-to-suit opportunities, he said.

"Under TC25, we also seek out merger and acquisition opportunities, explore non-traditional investment opportunities and embrace sustainability and prudent risk management," he added.

On the upcoming 2020 Budget to be tabled on Oct 11, 2019, Ng hopes the government would consider reducing the withholding tax for personal investors investing in REIT to zero per cent from 10 per cent at the moment.

"What the Malaysian REIT Managers Association (MRMA) has written (in its budget wishlist) relates to the withholding tax for individual investors. Today, whatever yield that the investor gets is subject to a deduction of 10 per cent.

"What we are telling the Securities Commission, as well as the the Ministry of Finance is, if we are to be as competitive as REITs in Singapore (we have to reduce the individual withholding tax for REIT)," he said.

Ng said the reduction of the individual withholding tax hopefully would attract more investors to invest in Malaysian REITs moving forward.

Singapore’s currently individual withholding tax for REIT is at zero per cent.

-- BERNAMA