ALI, SM Prime win real estate awards

MANILA, Philippines - Ayala Land Inc. and SM Prime Holdings, Inc have been recognised for their high standards by the Asia Pacific Real Estate Association (APREA) in the APREA Best Practices Awards 2012.

The APREA Best Practices Awards are open to all real estate companies and trusts listed on a regional stock exchange. As with previous years, there has been overwhelming response from high-quality organizations from countries around the region, including Australia, India, China, Japan, Malaysia, New Zealand, Singapore and the Philippines. In all, organizations from nine different jurisdictions lodged submissions.

Winners were chosen based on how an organization has contributed to providing greater transparency and comparability in their local market and the region. Submissions were also judged on the extent of which they have adopted recommendations in the APREA Best Practices Handbook in the categories of market disclosures, accounting and financial reporting, property valuation, portfolio performance reporting and corporate governance.

Ayala Land won awards for the best Philippines submission and merit awards in the areas of market disclosure and portfolio performance reporting.  It also won an award as the best property development organisation in the Emerging Markets category. SM Prime won a merit award in the area of corporate governance.

Lim Swe Guan, CFA, chairman of the board of APREA says, “We are delighted with the level of best practices demonstrated by the companies who submitted for the awards this year. We continually encourage members to adopt the most up-to-date valuation techniques, adhere to international financial reporting standards and follow good corporate governance. Combined with a greater transparency of portfolio performance and provision of reliable timely information to investors, we believe this will lead to higher investor confidence and wider support for the industry. We are confident that with the support of our members, who are leaders in their field, we can make real estate a crucial part of every investor’s portfolio.”

Peter Mitchell, chief executive officer of APREA said “We would like to extend our congratulations to Ayala Land and SM Prime Holdings as industry leaders in best practices. These awards are held annually to highlight the importance of the recommendations in APREA’s Best Practices Handbook, which has emerged as a clear benchmark for the region for managing and reporting performances since it was first published in 2009.”

APREA has developed best practices to streamline performance measurement and reporting for the real estate investment industry in the region. The APREA Best Practices Handbook, currently in its second edition, is intended to be a living document and will be regularly modified, updated and added to. It contains a series of recommendations for adoption by the industry in the following areas:

• Accounting and financial reporting guidelines

• Property valuation Corporate governance

• Portfolio performance reporting

• Market disclosures

The APREA Best Practices Handbook is accessible via the APREA website at www.aprea.asia.