Banyan Tree reports 14% net profit growth for Q3 at S$49.1m

SINGAPORE: Resort and spa operator Banyan Tree has reported a 14 percent increase in net profit for Q3 at S$49.1 million.

Banyan Tree is seeing strong growth in its hotel operations – one of three pillars that are driving revenue growth.

But it saw a sharp drop in revenue from the hotel residences segment, which came in at S$3.6 million, down from S$9.1 million a year ago.

Banyan Tree sold 14 units of villas and townhouses in Phuket and Lijiang in the quarter. But the sales of S$30.7 million will only be booked progressively over the next 1 to 1.5 years.

Ho Kwon Ping, executive chairman of Banyan Tree Holdings, said: "The strategic importance is that essentially when you sell them down, the remaining holding cost for the hotel for you goes down dramatically, so then the profitability of the hotel increases tremendously, so in that sense it's very important for us. "We don't anticipate that it will be much of a problem in terms of property cycles.

It's not that big a project to begin with. We give a guaranteed income so a lot of the people who buy them are already very wealthy individuals who are not speculating in the property market."