Ascendas India Trust (a-iTrust ) says it achieved $30.9 million in total property income for the first quarter ending 30 June 2010 (1Q FY2010/11), an increase of 4% from the corresponding quarter last year. Net property income was $18.9 million or 3% higher.

Jonathan Yap, Chief Executive Officer of a-iTrust’s trustee-manager, says, “Property income this quarter grew year-on-year, despite total income-producing space in the portfolio remaining stable over this period. We had a healthy level of leasing activities in the first quarter, when 230,000 sq ft worth of leases were finalised, exceeding the 190,000 sq ft of space which expired during this period. Such efforts had ensured that portfolio occupancy rate remain high, at 97%. Upcoming addition of 1.2 million sq ft of new space later this year is expected to further contribute to the expansion of the portfolio income base. The space addition is from Park Square (a retail mall in International Tech Park Park Bangalore (ITPB)) and Zenith (an IT Multi-tenanted Building (MTB) in International Tech Park Chennai (ITPC), for which pre-leasing is in progress.”

Distributable income for the quarter was $12.7 million, registering a decrease of 19% over the same period last year. This was mainly due to realised gains in 1Q last year of $4.1 million, from settlement of forward foreign exchange contracts. In contrast, there was a realised loss of $0.7 million in 1Q FY2010/11. The forward contracts were entered into to hedge repatriation of distributable income, as part of a-iTrust’s policy to mitigate the risk of unexpected exchange rate changes at the time of repatriation. The decrease in distributable income was also partly the result of higher tax expense, due to increases in tax rates in India applicable to the reporting period.

As a result, DPU for the quarter amounted to 1.66 cents, down 19% from the same quarter last year. This represents an annualised yield of 7.1% and 6.7% respectively over the closing prices of $0.94 and $0.995 per unit on 30 June 2010 and 22 July 2010. Distribution is semi-annual, hence the first quarter’s distribution will be made with next quarter’s.

Gearing remained low at 21% as at 30 June 2010. Net asset value attributable to unitholders was $ 0.85 per unit.