SM PRIME Holdings, Inc., the country’s largest shopping mall developer and operator, saw an 11 % increase in net income for the first half of the year, to P2.9 billion.
 

In a statement, SM Prime President Mr. Hans T. Sy said the company was buoyed by gross revenues, which grew 22% to P7.45 billion due to the opening of new malls.

SM Prime opened SM Mall of Asia, its biggest mall at 380,000 square meters in May last year. Other malls that opened last year were SM City Sta. Rosa, SM City Lipa, SM City Clark, SM Supercenter Pasig, and The Block which is a mall extension of SM North ED SA.

This year, SM Prime opened SM City Bacolod. ‘It (strong revenues) reflects the fact that our aggressive expansion last year is genera ting benefits beyond our expectations, as our new malls enjoy very high occupancy levels and record foot traffic. The SM Mall of Asia is clearly in the radar screen of Filipino consumers, foreign and domestic tourists, and other groups who have made it the prime destination mall in the country;’ Mr. Sy said.

‘We expect foot traffic in the Mall of Asia to further improve toward the fourth quarter as adjacent buildings in the area such as the SMX Convention Center and SM’s BPO building, the OneEcom Center, both open for business sometime in October this year;’ he added.

Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization was up 18% to P5.2 billion. Rental revenues expanded by 22% to P6.15 billion while cinema ticket sales grew 28% to P969 million.

Operating expenses going up by 29.41 % to P3.3 billion from P2.55 billion. The company reported a 17.23% growth in income from operations at P4.15 billion from P3.54 billion.

Quarterly profits of SM Prime rose 12% to P1.43 billion while gross revenues climbed 21 % to P3.9 billion. Operating income went up 17% to P2.15 billion although operating expenses grew by a quarter to P1.75 billion.

SM Prime is scheduled to open SM City Taytay and SM Supercenter Muntinlupa. Expansion of existing malls are ongoing, namely, SM City Cebu Annex and SM City Pampanga. Construction of the Science Dis¬covery Center at the SM Mall of Asia and the Sunset Strip at the Esplanade of SM BayCity is also underway and expected to be opened in October this year.

By end-2007, total gross floor area for all SM Prime malls is projected to reach 3.9 mil lion square’ meters: ‘After opening our state-of-the art 32-lane bowling center, we are also looking forward to the opening of the Science Discovery Center and Planetarium’ at the Mall of Asia and the Sunset Strip fronting Manila Bay this October. These will be new concepts for our: customers to enjoy and learn from, and make the country’s largest mall an even more interesting and diverse destination;’ Mr. Sy said.