Montello Real Estate Opportunity Fund Feb 2015 Factsheet
Cygnet Executive Summary Powerpoint Presentation
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2. Recent activity on the auction floors shows that investors are now chasing yields. Commercial real estate is seen as one of the safest investments to park capital during volatile equity and exchange rate environments. We believe that there are seven main reasons why commercial real estate prices will hold for now, and certain sectors will see price increases: Reason #1 A Reserve Bank bias towards low interest rates: Over recent months, interest rates have held steady. Investors know that in this environment interest rates will remain low and fixed-rate mortgage debt remains reasonably priced. Reason #2 Urbanization and the influx of people from other African states: Although urbanization certainly has its critics, the upside is that economic development and open borders have bolstered the growth and development of South African cities. Moreover, South Africa’s main metropolitan areas continue to attract entrepreneurially minded migrants from neighboring countries and smaller provinces. Reason #3 Uncertainty overhangs in the equities market: The broader equities market has been unpredictable. Corporate profits have been stable and governance is strong. However, price-earnings (P/E) ratios have fallen and the market is generally moving sideways. A large amount of uncertainty originates from three major sources: commodity prices, the Rand and domestic politics. Reason #4 The supply side has slowed: At one stage, there was great concern that we were building too many new shopping centers, office blocks and industrial centers. However, with localized exceptions, supply has moderated and has slowed down in the medium term. Reason #5 Momentum in listed properties flow: Looking at the strength of listed real estate, capital is starting to flow towards selected commercial property. Reason #6 Improved risk management: We believe that cap rate compression may be coming to commercial real estate. It has previously come in the form of higher P/E ratios to the broader equities, so why not real estate? In fact, there are very good financial economic reasons for lower long-run cap rates (and they are not just related to lower interest rates). Reason #7 South African corporations are doing well: Despite the occasional bad results from certain listed companies involved in construction and property development, our local companies have done really well. Notwithstanding a recessionary environment since late 2008, we have not seen one listed company go bust as we did a decade ago. Auction Alliance Press Release
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4. The Case for Whole Stock Portfolios." One of the underlying tenets is that specialization within equity portfolio management has gone too far; thus resulting in sub-optimal portfolios and high service costs. CYGNET is structured as a close corporation designed to capitalize on industry research performed by one of the founding members, Sagren Pillay. The team presents this business plan as a "start from scratch" outline of what a successful property portfolio management organization should look like as the industry evolves in response to political, social, technological, and global sentiment. CYGNET will offer high net worth investor’s opportunity to maximize profits and a capital growth element in exchange for contributions to CYGNET’S operating capital and for providing seed funds to establish the investment products described herein. This document alone does not constitute an offer of any type, nor does it provide any guarantee, financial, or otherwise. Risks associated with the CYGNET FINANCIAL SERVICES business plan are not limited to those detailed in this document. COMPANY SUMMARY CYGNET FINANCIAL SERVICES is structured as a Close Corporation, incorporated in the Republic of South Africa. It has been designed to capitalize on property industry research performed by one of the founding members, Sagren Pillay. This company is unique because it differs substantially from the way most existing investment management firms operate. Many of the firms created in the last 15 years were started by the departure of portfolio managers from the country's largest banks, insurance companies, and brokerage firms. Generally, these individuals were deep in investment management but novice as it concerns the business and operating side of running an organization. The investment plan for CYGNET is different. CYGNET has been founded by managers and entrepreneurs with in-depth knowledge of all aspects concerning property investment organizations. Professional talent will be acquired and retained by offering key individuals and professional service companies’ competitive compensation to include equity stakes. INVESTMENT PHILOSOPHY CYGNET believes the goal of South African property portfolios should be to outperform the broad market, as measured by the JSE Index. Exposure to economic sectors will roughly approximate those of the benchmark. Our view is that any deviation from the benchmark represents a bet, or in our case, a calculated risk that will determine over or under performance. Portfolios will also maintain market cap exposure to large cap (>R400 million), mid cap (R100 million to R400 million), and small cap (<R 100 million) properties. Like weightings to economic sectors, the weight of the portfolio allocated to large, medium, or small properties represents a bet relative to the benchmark. On average, our portfolios will hold roughly 1/3 of their value in large cap assets, and 2/3 of their value in mid and small cap assets. This distribution among capitalization ranges represents a modest bet that mid and small cap assets will outperform, consistent with studies showing small property portfolios outperform larger property portfolios in the long run.
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6. Two other loan stocks, Acucap and Fortress A, are achieving double-digit returns for the year to date. Keillen Ndlovu, the head of property funds for Stanlib, said in a blog for the PLSA website that eight listed property companies, representing about 60 percent of the listed property sector on the JSE, released annual financial results last month and posted a weighted average income growth of 6.8 percent. environment. Ndlovu said this was not bad compared with the average inflation rate of 4 percent, although there were some notable disappointments, such as Hyprop's lower-than-expected income growth and Emira forecasting negative income growth. He added that there was a general downward trend in overall vacancies across the portfolios reporting and the retail sector, especially the larger shopping centers, continued to do better than other sectors. "The retail sector, and particularly bigger shopping centers, continues to outperform the office and hospitality sectors, which are still feeling the effects of a weaker economy and oversupply," he said. However, Ndlovu stressed there were still some major risks to note and at macro level, slower economic growth and rising bond yields were a concern for asset managers, while steep increases in operating costs, particularly utilities and taxes, were making it difficult for landlords to negotiate better rentals with tenants. Ndlovu said Stanlib was forecasting a slowdown in income growth to about 5.5 percent for the coming year with an 8.4 percent forward yield for the listed property sector, which was likely to be better than cash and bonds. Business Report MARKET ANALYSIS SUMMARY Much of our analysis focuses on the commercial and industrial segment of the property investment industry because it is such a large component of the overall landscape. We have additionally provided information as it pertains to the management of separately managed portfolios (i.e. "separate accounts"). To understand the data here, one must understand that separate account managers must register their firms with the FSB. Thus, they are known as "Financial Service Providers." For CYGNET, the technologies we have selected will enable us to capitalize by utilizing both product types. Our analysis supports the 10% to 12% projected capital growth rates by outside sources. Profits on development projects can be as high as 26%, with rental portfolios returning 8, 5% per annum. Probably the most important aspect to these projections are the factors that will fuel these rates of growth. The following section contains some of the key variables to creating this growth environment. Medium cost housing projects are also viable investments in the three to five year term. All are expected to have a positive impact on the investment industry for at least the next five to ten years.
7. Government asks private sector's help with housing Human Settlements Minister Tokyo Sexwale has made a plea to businesses, individual stakeholders, private sector institutions and donor agencies to "go the extra mile" and assist the government in reducing the housing backlog to prevent social unrest erupting. The Department of Human Settlements was unable to address the burden of the housing backlog on its own, Sexwale said at the launch of the "Each One Settle One" campaign at the JSE yesterday. The campaign aims to mobilize various stakeholders, including the top 200 JSE-listed companies, to assist the department in providing decent shelter to more than 2 million households living in squatter camps, as well as in informal settlements. Sexwale said the number of informal settlements in the country had grown from 800 when he was Gauteng premier to 2 500 today. The housing backlog under his watch had increased from 2.1 million houses when he became minister to 2.3 million, despite his department building 200 000 houses a year. Sexwale attributed this situation to the increasing number of households and the decrease in the size of households, admitting that the government had got itself into "a very tight situation since 1994" by providing free houses for the poor. "It was not the best thing to do. We can't provide free housing forever but we have got to do that because we can't turn our backs against the poor. It's not their fault they are in that situation," Sexwale said. He stressed that the new campaign was not aimed at bringing all corporate social investment involving housing under one umbrella. The government knew about the social investment by corporates. The campaign was aimed at telling corporates "what is not happening". "We have to go the extra mile. Something else has to be done. We need all hands on deck," he said. Sexwale warned that if there was a second recession in the country it would introduce social instability. "The protests of our people are beginning to get violent every day. It's worrying. The police are shooting every day. Let's work together to try and stem the tide." Sexwale said housing was not just a social expenditure item but an economic dynamo because it contributed massively to economic growth. "It stimulates the whole financial system and when it doesn't happen, the world starts burning and we just don't know where it ends." He said it was easy for firms to hide behind corporate social investment but it would "not keep this problem at bay". A social investment desk had been created in the department to manage the activities of the campaign and projects on a project-by-project basis. Khanyisile Kweyama, the executive head of human resources at Anglo American Platinum, said it embraced the campaign and was contributing R1.4 billion towards facilitating the building of 20 000 houses for its employees over the next 10 years. Leon van Schalkwyk, the group executive of strategic finance at Impala Platinum, said it had a proven track record in community-based housing solutions through its extensive home ownership programme in the North West to uplift its employees, which had resulted in the construction of more than 1 500 freestanding units over a three-year period. It therefore made perfect business sense to get involved in this campaign, he said. Business Report
8. SALES STRATEGY CYGNET'S property investment portfolio will be initially offered through an FSB registered administration fund. Technological advancements also permit for other economically feasible distribution channels such as separately managed portfolios for large account sizes. Based on our large, medium and small cap projects, revenue streams will be continuous from year 3. Ideally, clients should look to invest in the medium to long term to maximize profitability and returns. CYGNET generates its revenue from Administration Fees for services rendered on behalf of its clients. The chart and table below provide a more detailed look at our projected sales strategy. COMPETITIVE EDGE ''Companies are nothing but men and women and their work. That which comes forth from a company is only as fine as the effort put into it.'' ''A customer is a person who brings us his wants-it is our job to fulfill those wants.'' The above quotes reflect the philosophy and ethos of CYGNET. Only by fine effort and effective control will we accomplish and attain our goals and those of our investors. CYGNET will centralize and standardize all property management systems, controls, responsibilities and personnel. Unlike other investment companies who generalize and pay dividends to all clients in their portfolios, we will strive to manage each client on a personal basis, and to maximize returns for each and every client. MARKET STRATEGY CYGNET is based in Kwa-Zulu Natal and has excellent local knowledge of markets, trends and development nodes in the region. Our initial focus will be to invest locally, before expanding into other regions. This will only be done via thorough market analysis and project planning. We will utilize our website to find investment properties and opportunities, as well as to market our portfolios. We are registered with the Debt Control Council. The Estate Agency Affairs Board and will register with the Financial Services Board, to ensure legal compliance. We will charge an Administration Fee to our clients based on investment levels. Fees will approximate 1, 5% of investment. MILESTONES CYGNET will strive to have projects in place and capitalization of R 2, 3 billion by 2015. This is a bold plan, but is highly achievable given the available projects and infrastructural changes that are being effected in South Africa.
9. We have attached Large, Medium and Small Cap targets as per our initial market analysis. MANAGEMENT SUMMARY CYGNET has compiled a management team, and will employ candidates for other key positions, should it be required. We would prefer to use outside consultants and professional teams on a project basis, and according to each entity ’ s specific strengths. Sagren Pillay is the managing member of the corporation. Sagren has been involved in company management for the past fifteen years. David Larkan is a registered and practicing accountant. David graduated and was articled with KPMG, prior to going into private practice. He also holds a CEA qualification. David has been in the accounting profession for the past 22 years and in the property industry for seven years.