Cebu Landmasters FY23 profit: P4.6-B (up 29%)

Cebu Landmasters [CLI 2.85 unch] [link] teased its FY23 performance at an analyst briefing where it revealed full-year net income of P4.6 billion (up 29%) and total revenues of P18.8 billion (up 20%). CLI said it saw “robust topline growth across all segments”, with real estate sales up 20%, revenue from leasing up 42%, and revenue from hotel and recreational development up 66%. In terms of FY24 outlook, CLI said it expects to launch P27.6 billion worth of projects this year, add 48,590 square meters of gross leasable area to its commercial segment, add 459 keys to its hospitality segment, and spend approximately P14.5 billion on capital expenditures (83% for project development, 11% for landbanking). 

MB BOTTOM-LINE: While FY23’s numbers all beat CLI’s FY22 segmented performances in absolute terms, the relative growth of each segment has slowed in most cases (except for commercial leasing, which really performed well this year). For example, CLI’s FY22 increase in real estate sales was 40% (20% this year) and its increase in hotel revenue was 71% (66% this year). As an investor, I expect to see growth slow over time as an organization expands, but despite the fantastic presentation, I don’t get a good sense from CLI as to whether the relative underperformance is just an artifact of revenue recognition or if there are some larger roadblocks in play. Credit where credit is due, though: I applaud CLI for disclosing the slide deck that it presented to the analysts in the briefing. There’s no better way to get a condensed feel for CLI’s potential topline growth than this deck. I wish more companies would do this. It’s a massive improvement over the press release summary that CLI provided last year. They’ve taken strides to improve their communications strategy.