ICTSI sells stake in Cebu Port operator

MANILA, Philippines - Port giant International Container Terminal Services Inc. (ICTSI) has divested its entire interest in the port operator in Cebu in favor of a member of conglomerate Jardine Matheson Group of Hong Kong.

ICTSI treasury director Arthur Tabuena said in a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) that the port operator together with other shareholders divested 250 million common shares representing 100 percent of the authorized and outstanding capital stock of Cebu International Container Terminal Inc. (CICTI).

Tabuena said ICTSI owns 51 percent of CICTI.

He pointed out that the shares were sold to Cebu Asian Rim Property & Development Corp. and Hong Kong Land (Philippines) BV which is a member of the Jardine Matheson Group.

CICTI owns a parcel of land approximately 200,000 square meters in Mandaue City.

No details were provided including the cost of transaction as officials cited confidentiality agreement with the buyers.

Earnings of ICTSI jumped 27 percent to $135.65 million in the first nine months of the year from $106.84 million in the same period last year on the back of strong revenues arising from its continued expansion overseas.

The port operator attributed the higher net income attributable to equity holders for the first nine months to strong revenue growth and margin improvement in certain key terminals and the contribution from the new terminal in Karachi, Pakistan.

Revenues from port operations rose 19 percent to $624.7 million in the first nine months of the year from $524.7 million in the same period last year as consolidated volume handled increased 13 percent to 4.628 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) from 4.083 million TEUs.

The listed firm attributed the increase in volume to the continuous growth in international and domestic trade in most of the company’s terminals and the volume generated by Pakistan International Container Terminal in Karachi and PT Olah Jasa Andal in Jakarta, Indonesia.

“The increase in revenues was mainly due to the volume growth, higher storage revenues and ancillary services, tariff rate increases in certain key terminals, and the revenue contribution from the new terminals in Jakarta, Indonesia and Karachi, Pakistan,” ICTSI said.

Excluding the revenues from the newly acquired terminals and the effect of the cessation of the operations in Syria last January, ICTSI said organic revenue growth was at one percent.