SM PRIME Holdings, Inc. and Ayala Land, Inc. have been recognized for their high standards by the Asia Pacific Real Estate Association (APREA) in the APREA Best Practices Awards 2011.
SM Prime was awarded the Highly Commended prize in the Emerging Markets category, and also picked up merit awards in the categories of valuation and corporate governance.
Ayala Land was awarded a merit prize in the category of portfolio performance reporting.
SM Prime was also given a merit award for best submission from the Philippines.
Lim Swe Guan, CFA, chairman of the board of APREA says: ‘APREA has developed best practices to streamline performance measurement and reporting for the real estate investment industry in the region. Members are encouraged to adopt state of the art valuation techniques, conform to international financial reporting standards and embrace good corporate governance Greater transparency of portfolio performance, providing comprehensive, useful and timely information to investors and a culture of unimpeachable ethics will lead to higher investor confidence and wider support for the industry. Adopting best practices
is vital to ensuring that real estate continues to form an integral component of every investor’s portfolio.’
Peter Mitchell, Chief Executive Officer of APREA said: ‘We at APREA are proud with the extent of industry support of and participation in the APREA Best Practices Awards. These Awards help highlight the importance of APREA’s Best Practices Handbook recommendations and we believe will go a long way in addressing the issues of fragmentation in the Asian real estate market as well as influence a greater harmonization in standards and industry practices. Congratulations must go out to SM Prime Holdings and Ayala Land as industry leaders in best practices.’
The APREA Best Practices Handbook contains a series of recommendations for adoption by the industry in the following areas: accounting and financial reporting guidelines, property valuation, corporate governance, portfolio performance reporting, market disclosures and sustainability.
The APREA Best Practices Awards were open to all real estate companies and trusts listed on a regional stock exchange.
The response to the Awards was high, with many submissions received from a number of countries including Japan, Singapore, New Zealand, Australia, Malaysia, the Philippines and India.
Submissions were judged by a selection committee comprised of a number of international investors and valuers with extensive experience working with regional listed real estate entities in areas such as accounting and financial reporting, property valuation, real estate securities research and funds management.