How big is its Sarawak estates? Bplant would need to be a nett cash company for Boustead/LTAT to take it private via SCR. It would need to have nett cash of close to RM1.0 billion in order for the parents not to require external debts.

Currently there are certain groups of investors who are still skeptical of the current palm oil price rally, the sentiment on plantation stocks are dampened by bearish local analysts like RHB, CIMB, Kenanga etc who still predict that average CPO price for this year 2022 will be around RM4,000-4,200/tonne. To me this is a ridiculous assumption as YTD average CPO price already exceeds RM6,000/t and it looks set to remain high at least until end of August 2022. I do not know why these analysts are so bearish on CPO prices and plantation stocks, whether they have own hidden agenda to prevent those plantation stocks share price to shoot up so that these broker houses who have issued plantation call warrants will not need to pay high settlement prices for call warrants, or they are purely too egolistic to correct own bearish view.
They were conservative in January before the invasion of Russia into Ukraine, that was okay. But after the Ukraine war has been going on for 2 months with no sight of ending soon, they are still sticking to own projection for a low average CPO price for 2022, trying to find all sorts of reasons to justify their bearish view like Malaysia will soon be getting 30k foreign labour into the plantation sector to help harvesting. That is nonsense. They are totally on the wrong foot!
How much CPO production would Malaysian planters be able to harvest more with more foreign labour? Malaysia only exports about 18 million tonnes of CPO a year, how will Malaysia be able to fulfill the gap left over by Indonesia who is trying hard to restrict export of CPO and refined products?

To me, it makes more sense for bigger plantation boys like KLK, IOI or Sime Plantation to take over Bplant at a valuation much lower than their own. KLK took over IJM Plantation at close to RM70,000/ha for IJM Plantation estates in Sabah, it could launch a take over offer for Bplant at RM70,000/ha or about RM2.30 per share, which would still be earnings acretive to KLK, adding precious and sizable freehold plantation estates in Malaysia and still has plenty of room to improve on operational performance in later years.

I feel that privatisation may be a bit far stretched assumption as its parent Boustead Group is heavily indebted. It would be hard for it to raise fund to take it private. As Boustead already owns 57% of Bplant, there is not much point to take it private at a price close to the IPO price when it listed Bplant a few years back. Any privatisation offer at anything below RM1.50 would fail miserably.

RM2.00 will be an easy target within this year as there will be multiple re-rating factors coming in next few months:
(1) March qtrly result will show strong earnings on average CPO price of RM6,000/t
(2) March qtrly result will include the disposal gain from Kulai land and a potential special dividend
(3) May futures CPO broke up RM7,000/t and Jun futures touched RM6,800/t. CPO prices will remain high for next few months meaning that the average CPO to be realised by Bplant for the Jun quarter will be higher than RM6,000/t and hence higher earnings
(4) Bplant's parent is heavily indebted and needs cash asap. I predict that Bplant should be working on another land disposal deal and should announce it in next few months
(5) A potential take-over offer for BPlant may be on its way from potential suitors like KLK or Sime Plantation

https://klse.i3investor.com/web/blog/detail/dragon328/2022-04-26-story-h1622262012-BPlant_has_Tremendous_Upsides_as_a_Prime_Take_over_Target

On your second concern, Malaysia government might have its considerations in issuing a temporary ban of renewable energy export as it might want to raise the renewable energy mix in the country power generation to a higher level by 2035.
But sunlight is free and abundant and land is still cheap to make solar energy very affordable here. There are many developers small and big trying to get into renewable energy sector, taking clue from the over 100 bidders in the last round of large scale solar power bidding by Energy Commission. There is no reason why renewable energy should be banned further if domestic renewable energy projects are plenty and many developers here are pushing for solar energy projects including rooftop solar installations.

As the Singapore power import project is real (and sizable and lucrative) and it has attracted many international developers to participate, as far as an Australian consortium planning installing mega solar farm in Darwin and pulling an undersea cable of few thousand km to Singapore. This tender is open to all Malaysia consortium including Tenaga, Malakoff and any company linked to the Johor royal family. Therefore, there is no reason why Malaysian government would ban such bid attempt by a Malaysian consortium to participate in this tender and export renewable energy to Singapore, as it will create new jobs here, encourage good use of land in Johor and development in surrounding areas and enable the Malaysia company to make good money and bring in foreign money. How fast these local companies and Singapore government can lobby our government to agree to the power export to Singapore, I am not sure but good projects like this will come to fruition sooner or later.

As for data centre development, it is a different game from the power export to Singapore. Building data centre in Johor is a no-brainer winning strategy as I have explained in the article the electricity price difference between a solar farm in Johor and in Singapore. Obviously Johor Menteri Besar saw the opportunity too and hence local companies to set up data centre in Johor powered by renewable energy. This is going to be big and going to be the new game of the year.

The other way to quickly raise funds for Wessex and for YTLPI would be for YTLPI to list up certain stakes of Wessex on London stock exchange. As I pointed out earlier, the 3 listed water companies there are trading at 1.27x to 1.488x RCV. So if Wessex issued say 20% new shares for listing at 1.5x RCV, then equity valuation would be about 3.0 billion pounds and Wessex would raise cash of 600 million pounds to fund its capex for next 4 years and to pare down debts. YTLPI might list up another 10%-20% of its stakes in Wessex to take home cash of 300-600 million pounds to realise part of its investments at a premium now. YTLPI might buy back Wessex shares should it trade at lower valuation in later years. For instance, the listed water companies there have seen their share prices fluctuating in a 50% range, or -30% to +20% range. Let the market determine its value and YTLPI being the major shareholder and long term investor may just add stakes while its valuation is low and sell a little more if valuation is high.

Hi Observatory, good to hear from you in this forum. Let me try to provide some thoughts on your two concerns:
(1) Yes Ofwat has determined that for the 5-year determination period, the tariffs for Wessex will be lower than previous 5-year period on lower interest rates and higher performance standards. We can see that earnings contribution from Wessex to YTLPI has dropped from above RM200m per quarter in 2019 to now about RM150m per quarter in 2021. But there are a number of ways that enable Wessex to maintain similar dividend payouts as in previous 5-year period:
(i) to continue outperform peers in Ofwat ranking and get bonus payments which may be 3% - 5% of revenue or 15-25 million pounds
(ii) to get various grants in its business segments, for example Wessex received a total of 7.747 million pounds in FY2021
(iii) disposal of non-core assets, eg. disposal of assets raised cash of 8.9 million pounds in FY2021
(iv) to raise more debts to cover planned capex, eg. Wessex raised new debts of 395 million pounds in FY2021 compared to planned capex of 246 million pounds
(v) to use innovative ways and technology to help reduce capex but maintain performance and quality of service

Anyway it was disappointing to see a lower tariff determined by Ofwat in early 2020. I think water companies will fight for higher tariffs come 2025 for the next 5-year period of 2026-2030, given that interest rates will have increased a lot and each has higher regulated asset base then. We may see a quantum jump in earnings from Wessex from 2026 hopefully.

You can see that the selling of MS is getting less and less. Once they have sold those stocks bought at prices cheaper than RM0.60 then there is no reason for them to sell more shares which were bought at RM0.77 as pointed out by CIMB analyst.

There are three water utilities companies listed in London stock exchange: United Utilities, Svern Trent and Pennon. They are trading at PER of 20x to 36x, dividend yields of 4.67%, 3.35% and 3.23% respectively, and 1.27x Regulatory Capital Value (RCV), 1.42x RCV and 1.488x RCV. Therefore, it is not a dream for Wessex to be listed at 1.5x to 1.6x RCV considering it being a top ranked water company in the UK.

I am confident that YTL Power will be able to declare higher dividends as soon as this FY2022, given that things are getting better in Singapore and they have received a good handy cash of RM3.05 billion from the disposal of Electranet.
I would prefer them raising the annual dividends going forward rather than a one-off special dividend. Save half or RM1.5bn for future projects, the remaining RM1.5 bn cash may be used to raise up dividends by 2 sen to 5 sen every year for the next 5 years.
When dividends are raised to 10 sen per year in next 2-3 years, I do not see any reason why share price will not go back to previous level of RM1.50-1.60 as in 2015-2016 when dividends were 10 sen.

Windy1974, agree with you that YTL management is conservative. I have a friend who had a relative working inside YTL Power. He told me that the key management team in YTL Power was just a small handful of people but included all the necessary expertise in technical, commercial, legal, environmental etc. The management structure is lean and the bosses do not take home big fat fees like Genting boss. At bad years, the directors voluntarily forego their bonus and pay rise.
For new projects, the team is even more conservative. They would look into all possible risks for each project and try to find ways to mitigate each risk whether it is equipment risk, technical performance risk, accidents, country risk, counterparty risks, legal issues, environmental issues. When they finally agree to a contract, you can rest assured that all the risks are well covered and the investment is secured.
Just like when they bought into PowerSeraya, the timing was right when Temasek was desparate to sell and the electricity market was good. The acquisition was good otherwise no banker would lend to them at the time when Lehman's Brothers just collapsed and the world economy was going into recession. That showed to me that banks and bankers had high confidence that YTL would deliver and PowerSeraya would be able to serve its debts.
When YTL Power wanted to buy into the troubled Hyflux power plant, it sent me a signal that they knew the timing was right again to strike, meaning that they believe the market conditions in Singapore would be good again and they would make back money very quickly.

Congratulations to Philip on his Yinson giving him a 11x bagger. Agree with you that to make big money, you need to have an eye for the future. I believe one who bought into Yinson near RM0.30 in 2013 must have had good foresight or high convection in the management to deliver the growth. And there were good reasons why Yinson were trading at depressed level in 2013, as there were too many uncertainties out there and Yinson had not delivered the results. But you bought into it at 30 sen if you knew the business well and can reasonably project that business would start looking good for Yinson. It is a similar case now with YTL Power that trades at near decade low for some reasons, but I know very well that things are starting to get better and better for this company. I have over 15 years of working experience in the power industry and I can see that PowerSeraya will be doing well again from next year. To make big money, don't you have to see things faster than others and see things others don't? When you see the company delivering earnings jumps, then it will be too late to chase. Now it is the time to accumulate while it is still low.
I will not get you to chase if it has doubled in share price. On the contrary, its share price has dropped by half in past few years and the likelihood of it doubling back to RM1.50 is high. I have high convection in the management delivering this time. Even if share price does not move up, I will still enjoy good steady dividends of over 6.7% p.a. Can you tell me which other stock that can give dividends yields of over 6.7% p.a. and may have chance to double its share price in 2-3 years?

What I am trying to say is that for YTL Power to be a 10x bagger, it will need to do all the right things. I am not a short term trader and do not expect YTLPI to shoot up few times in next few weeks or months. It holds long term assets that take time to deliver value to the holding company. YTLPI will need to take initiatives to monetise part of the assets at a premium price at the right time, to continue managing existing companies for them to maximise profits, and to look for new lucrative projects. If it does the right things, then it may be worth 10x higher. Of course whether the share price will move up so much will depend on whether the company can deliver the profit growth and declare higher dividends in next 3 years. I am a freelance researcher and like to share what I analyse and why I think it is undervalued to other like-minded investors. YTL Power is coming at a low base now, way cheaper than few years back. If analysts gave a fair value of RM1.60 to YTLPI in 2015, why now give lower for a company with stronger footing now and embarking on next growth phase? Please note that Wessex's RAB is now 30% higher than in 2015, Electranet has been sold at 5x higher than the value given by an analyst, the company is in nett cash position, PowerSeraya is going into a tight supply market, and the green data centre park has started with a bang.

4. Yes companies with high debts usually have low profitability but sometimes in order to expand you need to borrow, it cannot be using 100% equity money to acquire another company as equity money is always more expensive than debts. Warren Buffet did invest in utilities company like the railroad company BNSF with some borrowings and he thought it would be a key asset for Berkshire a century from now. DNex did borrow money to buy over SilTerra, otherwise it would have missed this opportunity. HIbiscus also need to borrow in order to take over Rapsol assets that will give it doubling oil extraction capacity. Warren Buffet bought into BNSF at a bargain and it may have been a multi-bagger for Berkshire if the asset is sold at a premium. Warren Buffer also bought into OXY, an oil shale company at a good price though it is a debt-laden company. Do you know that OXY cash flows are now so strong that it could repay all of its USD10 billion debts within this year if oil prices stay at USD100 per bbl? OXY share price dropped to as low as USD 10 in Mar 2020 and now trading at USD60, already 6x higher. I expect OXY share price to reach USD100 later this year or next giving Warren Buffet a 10x bagger. Debts are not scary if the company knows how to use it properly. Even Yinson needs to borrow heavily with debts now over RM8.0 billion, otherwise it will not be able to grow and bag new contracts. Anyway, YTL Power is a nett cash company now at holding level, with debts ring fenced at subsidiary levels.

3. Utilities are long term assets and provide long term stable returns, you do not expect a utility company to give you 10x returns in short period of time. But if you have patience, buy one at a dsicount and hold them long enough then sell it off at a premium at the right time, they can give you many many times returns. YTLPI just did that with Electranet with 25x returns of equity money in 20 years. But now we are talking about a share price of a stock that may go up 5x to 10x in 2-3 years. There are many examples recently. In Bursa, Yinson went up from RM0.30 in Mar 2013 to RM3.50 in July 2019, giving investors 11x returns in 6 years. It is also in a business with huge capex but with the right investment decisions, Yinson managed to bag lucrative contracts to grow big. DNex share price shot up from RM0.20 in Jan 2021 to RM1.33 in Feb 2022, giving a 6.5x returns in just one year. Hibiscus share price increased from a low of RM0.24 in Mar 2020 to RM1.38 in Mar 2022, a 5.7x increase in 2 years. Hibiscus may become a 10x bagger if it continues going up another 50% as oil prices remain hign above USD100 per bbl.

2. Yes utilities business has high stability and requires high capex for maintenance and expansion. As in the case of Wessex being a regulated business, high capex is a good thing as it will increase its regulated asset base (RAB) faster and the water tariffs there depend on RAB multipled by the agreed WACC to provide a fixed return to water companies. Yes, Hyflux went burst as it entered into power generation business at the wrong time when the electricity market was entering an over supply situation. It is a cyclic business there with merchant electricity market, I believe Hyflux decided to go into power generation (away from its water business) due to the high power generation margin before 2013 but it was not aware of how bad the over supply situation might get it into trouble. Again it all comes back to the management capability and its investment strategy to see if an investment goes well or goes burst. YTL Power bought into PowerSeraya at a bargain just after Lehman's Brothers collapsed so Temasek was willing to sell. At good times like 2005-2007, no one would sell a controlling stake at a bargain. Again, YTL Power is buying over Hyflux at a discount to its asset, and at a price even cheaper than building a new power plant. You need to wait patiently for such an opportunity to scoop up good assets at a bargain price. If you read carefully what I wrote in the article, for this investment in PowerSeraya, YTL Power had long time ago taken back all its equity money, leaving some debts pushed down to the asset level.

Philip, you are a veteran investors and a veteran in i3 forum and I am just a small investor trying to make some money from hardwork research. I will try to reply to your points:
1. Yes telco is a high capital business and DIGI, Celcom and Maxis have spent a lot to get to the positions they are in now. If YTL Comms tried to spend the same amount of capex to penetrate the market held by these telcos, it would be a suicide. But now the game has changed. The market is coming to 5G era and the good thing is that DNS is going to spend the heavy capex to build the 5G network and each telco just pays the equal access fee to roll out the 5G business. The telcos have a choice to subscribe for some equity in the network owner but it is not mandatory. The 5G pie is huge enough to accommodate 5 players and how much market share each can get will depend on their marketing effort and return expectation. I do not see it a big difficulty for YTL Comms to get a 15% market share out of 5 service providers. The fact shows that it is a high margin business with DIGI EBITDA margin at 50% in past few years.

Sslee, I have read what you wrote about Insas and how undervalued it was. I did buy some Insas but unfortunately the timing of entry was not right and now I get stuck in it. If I had a fixed monthly income like yourself, I would also slowly accumulate good stocks like YTL Power and enjoy the multiyear expansion rewards and steady dividends, unfortunately I do not have a fixed monthly income. I have to put in money earned from investment to buy stocks like Insas and YTL Power, and most people want their investments to return positive gains as soon as possible.

Sslee, why do you think Kook Yew Yin keeps promoting steel counters and Leno and yourself promoting Insas?

Furthermore, electricity market in Singapore is cyclic and YTLPower has managed to recoup all equity investment before the market entered into over-supply situation and weathered through the long period of low margins from 2014 to 2020, now entering a margin expansion phase in next few years. There is a real possibility for PowerSeraya to earn over SGD 300 million a year again just like it did in 2007-2012. Just imagine if it does, then PowerSeraya will be able to pare down borrowings to near zero in next 5 years and this investment is all free. YTLPI's next generation and next next generations will be able to enjoy the fruits of investment for many more years to come.

The investment in PowerSeraya was a huge success, contrary to most belief. What I know is that YTL Power has recouped all its equity money put in this SGD3.8 billion deal to acquire 100% stakes in PowerSeraya during the few years when generation margin was good in 2009-2012. Just imagine that an equity money of more than SGD1.1 billion was gotten back within 3-4 years and debts at PowerSeraya reduced by few hundred million dollars. Now left is still 100% stakes in PowerSeraya that is the second largest power plant in Singapore. You need to know that power generation licence in Singapore is very very hard to get, even harder than getting an IPP licence in Malaysia. An IPP licence in Malaysia may last just 21 years but a generating licence in Singapore lasts forever.

It is an unfair statement that the management of YTLPI has many failed project like Singapore operations. It is true that they had not been able to find good deals since 2009 when interest rates were pressed to near zero and asset value was inflated. I would rather wait for the right opportunity too strike rather than buta-buta chasing high asset value with single-digit returns.

ValueInvestor888, true that Singapore government is smart and they were very smart in 2013 when they brought in LNG into Singapore market and crashed the elctricity supply market pricing. But the utilities companies in Singapore have been taken over by international investors like YTL Power and China / Japanese owners, and they are not stxpid. All have learnt the mistake of signing up too much LNG in 2013 and suffered poor generation margin from 2014-2020, and they will not make the same mistake twice next year.

Lastly for future projects, interest costs and costs of doing new projects will be higher as interest rates move higher, but this disadvantage is felt by everyone else so it will not impede YTLPI's advantage in securing good lucrative projects like the green data centre deals or power export to Singapore.

Thirdly for PowerSeraya existing loans, interest costs will be higher as interest rates move up. This will be a strong reason for YTLPI to list up a portion of PowerSeraya stakes and raise money to pare down its borrowings.

Secondly for existing loans already secured under Wessex or to be secured for its capex expansion plan, the liquidity in the UK is huge and any interest rate movement will be taken care of by the water tariffs that always reflect cost of debts and level of gearing. For you info, the water tariffs for every 5 years will be set higher when interest rates are seen moving up to properly remunerate the 10 water companies in the UK for spending capex to maintain or upgrade the water assets there.

Higher interest rates may not have direct impact on its profits going forward. Firstly for existing project like Jordan power plant, financing is secured on project financing basis ring fenced to the project company level based on a fixed margin over LIBOR or similar. Typically the project company will enter into interest rate swaps to protect itself from interest rate fluctuations over the tenor of the project financing.

Multiple re-rating factors coming soon

https://klse.i3investor.com/web/blog/detail/dragon328/2022-04-22-story-h1621549755-YTL_Power_is_potentially_a_10x_Bagger

EPF needs cash for latest round of withdrawal by members up to RM10k each or estimated RM30-50 billion cash

With economic activities almost fully re-opened, YTL's construction and cement division may soon be becoming the largest profit contributor to the group.

With JB_Gemas multi-billion double track rail project well on track, construction division will contribute substantial earnings over next 2 years.

With the recent hikes in cement prices and full consolidation of YTL Cement into Malayan Cement that controls over 68% of Malaysia cement market share, the cement division will take off in coming months with few hundreds of million of profits in 2H2022.

YTL Power is currently enjoying a powerful re-rating which may take its share price doubling to RM1.50. If that happens, it will add another 30 sen of value to YTL's valuation.

Longer term prospects may include the revived KL-Singapore High Speed Rail project which it clinched the southern portion earlier before it was suspended, and a bigger high speed rail project linking KL to Thailand which may cost close to RM100 billion.

In terms of earnings prospect, it is certainly looking up for YTL this year. YTL Power earnings have bottomed up with Wessex & PowerSeraya contributing steady earnings and new projects coming up (Jordan power plant, solar farm, data centre, power export to Singapore, etc).

Cement division is looking even better with the recent hikes in cement prices in Dec 2021 from RM200-210 to RM270 per tonne, YTL's 77%-owned MCement may rake in net profit of almost RM1.0 billion for 2022 if cement prices stay at RM270-280 per tonne throughout the year.

Digital bank licence is a feather to the cap. YTL Corp is already very undervalued.

Its stakes in listed subsidiaries (YTL Power, MCement, YTL Hosp REIT and Starhill Global REIT) is already worth more than 70 sen per share. Minus nett debt of RM945m at holding company level, YTL is worth at least RM0.70 - 0.09 = RM0.61 per share.

At current share price of RM0.62, you are getting all its unlisted assets for free! The unlisted assets include YTL e-solutions, ERL, construction arm and Niseko landbank (itself worth 44 sen at market value).

A quick way to realise the value of Wessex is to list it up in London stock exchange by selling away say 30% stakes. Then YTLPower would get immediate cash of RM5.2 billion while retaining 70% control over Wessex that will have a market capitalisation of RM17.48 billion.

Did he mean that if we apply the same 1.6 times RCAB for Electranet on Wessex, we shall get an enterprise value of RM30.43 billion for Wessex?

If this is so, then the equity value of Wessex shall be RM30.43b - RM12.95b = RM17.48 billion or RM2.13 per share of YTLPower.

As MIDF pointed out in its report today, YTLPI disposed Electranet at a good premium of 1.6x regulated asset base. MIDF sees great value in its 100%-owned Wessex Waters that has a regulated asset base of RM19 billion. MIDF estimates an equity value of RM13 billion for Wessex, or RM1.58 per YTLPI share. An estimated equity value of RM13 billion plus debts of about RM13 billion at Wessex company level, valuing it at enterprise value of RM26 billion or 1.37x RAB.

Should we value Wessex at 1.6x RAB as in the case of Electranet, Wessex would be valued at RM30 billion and YTLPI's equity value in Wessex would be worth RM30 -13 = RM17 billion or RM2.07 per share.

You can run now and get few sen profit and wait for better entry price, or you may lose out bigger gains once profit taking is over.

This company is in mega infrastructure projects that take time to take off, and it owns perpetual regulated assets that always appreciate in value over time.

Right, MS made a mistake before by buying Media high at RM1.00 or above, now making another by selling low. It may continue selling 1.0-1.5 million shares per day as share price stays above 60 sen for another 2 months then its stake will become insignificant.

@choysun, we cannot read the article that needs subscription. Could you copy and paste the relevant paragraphs here?

@Faridfet, which research house announced a target price of RM2.90 for AEON?

@faridfet, this sounds good to me. Aeon management should set KPIs to be achieved for this amount of money spent, eg. sales increase for certain products or certain improvement in inventory control and hence cashflows.

The big block of 1.0 million shares blocking at 1.57 has been snapped up this morning. Today is the last day for calculating the settlement price for AEON-C10, so it does not matter if AEON share price shoots above RM1.60 today as the average for last 5 days will be less than RM1.60 and CIMB has succeeded in getting a zero settlement for the C10 call warrants it issued.

after today, there is no more reason for CIMB to block AEON from going higher. Incidentally, Maybank IB this morning issued a technical Buy on AEON with short term tp 1.65 then 1.79.

AEON share price dipped to 1.46 low yesterday on weak market sentiment but has since rebounded to challenge month high of 1.56.

These has been a big seller of over 1.0 million shares queued at 1.57 everyday in past few days. I suspect this seller is CIMB IB who issues the call warrant AEON-C10 that expires on 31 March. CIMB IB has all its reason to block AEON share price from reaching 1.60 so that it will not need to pay a single sen to settle all the call warrants C10 it has issued. Very wicked intention.

He mentioned that AEON has spent close to RM10 million installing solar panels at Taman Maluri and Alpha Angle malls. This would be for about 4.0 MW of solar power and would save abour RM2.9 million of electricity costs per year.

It is capex well spent as AEON would recoup investments within 3 years after incorporating green tax incentives.

Just imagine if AEON were to spend another RM100m capex to install solar panels in other 20 malls, it would save RM29 million of electricity costs every year for the next 25 years. This would raise earnings by 2.0 sen per share every year.

I particularly like the AEON Sayap Bagimu sustainability initiative mentioned by the CEO. Shafie says AEON brought in 400 suppliers comprising small enterprises in 2021. This is very smart and a win-win strategy, providing a platform for small enterprises to multiply their sales and at the same time broadening product offering especially local quality products and increasing sales for AEON.

This indirectly reinforces AEON's status as a community mall, supporting local small enterprises around and providing more product choices to the local community.

He was optimistic of AEON's prospects for 2022 with the gradual reopening of the economy. He noted that AEON non-essential businesses were closed for 119 days in 2021.

With the omicron wave coming to an end and no more MCO in vicinity, there is no reason why AEON will not perform better this year than 2021.

In last Saturday interview with The Star paper, AEON's CEO stated that the planned capex of RM200-250m for 2022 would include capex for a new departmental store. He also mentioned that the company has installed solar panels in Tmn Maluri AEON mall and would consider installing solar panels at other 30 malls that it owns.

I consider this amount of capex to be reasonable for good capital investment programs like roof-top solar panels and a new departmental store (instead of a more expensive new shopping mall).