Company Review: Metro (CPF)

More well known for its departmental store, Metro in fact does better with its property business.  The group owns and operates several prime retail and office properties in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Penang.  With the increase in properties prices and rents in major China cities, Metro is set to benefit from it.

Since the group is more geared towards property development, I use their NAV as a yardstick instead of PE and ROE.  I purchased 10 lots of Metro at an average price of $0.933, which translates to a discount of about 35% to its RNAV of $1.40.  Also, based on 2006 dividend, my current dividend yield stands at about 4.3%.  With Captial China Retail Reit having a yield of only two plus percent, Metro deserves a better price.