Ascendas Real Estate Investment Trust (A-Reit), which currently owns industrial assets only in Singapore, is seeking to buy properties in other parts of Asia.
The trust’s manager has established a representative office in Shanghai, and is “actively exploring” investment opportunities in China.
The Reit will follow its customers to serve their property needs in Asia, it said, adding that a geographically diversified portfolio will provide unit-holders “an opportunity to ride on growth in other Asian markets” and enable them to access property markets which they “could not access efficiently on their own”.
Among the other countries that may be of interest to the trust are Japan and Malaysia, according to The Business Times.
As of September 30, A-Reit has 92 properties in Singapore worth $4.8 billion, including business and science parks, logistics and distribution centres, warehouse retail facilities and hi-tech industrial properties.
The trust said that its investment focus in Asia will remain on these properties, and its manager “will persist in its disciplined evaluation of all potential investments”.
Its portfolio will still be dominated by Singapore-based assets “in the foreseeable future”, added A-Reit.