ProLogis (PLD), one of the leading global providers of distribution facilities, recently declared a third-quarter dividend of $0.15 per share.
The company had previously reduced its annual dividend payout to $0.70 per share from $1.00 declared earlier, significantly down from $2.07 in 2008. The move is aimed at conserving liquidity in the current credit-constrained market.
In response to the continued economic downturn and rapidly deteriorating industrial real-estate fundamentals, ProLogis had already stopped all new initiatives and early-stage developments. The company is currently concentrating on increasing its liquidity and deleveraging its balance sheet through asset sale.
ProLogis owns and manages interests in over 2,500 distribution facilities, service offices, and properties spanning 475 million square feet (including properties under development) of space. During the first quarter of 2009, the company sold its operations in China and Japan to affiliates of GIC Real Estate, the real-estate investment arm of the Government of Singapore Investment Corporation.
During the second quarter, ProLogis sold about 136 properties with an average age of 20 years. Spanning across 14.2 million square feet, the properties were located in markets like Chicago, Houston, Dallas, Atlanta, Memphis, Northern and Southern California, Seattle, Portland, Phoenix, Washington DC and Northern New Jersey.
ProLogis is the best-positioned industrial REIT in the current scenario. However, we maintain our Neutral recommendation on the stock in view of the overall decline of the industrial real estate sector.
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