Thank you for standing by, and welcome to the Centuria Capital Group FY 2024 results conference call. All participants are in a listen-only mode. There will be a presentation, followed by a question and answer session. If you wish to ask a question, you will need to press the star key, followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. I would now like to hand the conference over to Mr. John McBain, Centuria Capital Group Joint CEO. Please go ahead.
Good morning. Thank you for joining us. I'm John McBain, Joint Chief Executive, Centuria Capital, and together with Simon Holt, our Chief Financial Officer, and Tim Mitchell, Head of Distribution. W e're pleased to present Centuria's results for the FY 2024 year. This morning, I'll give an overview of the group, our FY 2024 highlights, comments regarding strategy and outlook. Simon will give a finance update, and then I'll present the real estate and funds management information. Starting on slide three, Centuria pays its respects to the traditional owners of the lands in Australia and New Zealand, and to their respective cultures and their elders, past and present. Moving to slide five. This slide provides an overview of the group, illustrating the scale and diversification throughout Australasia, with assets under management stabilized presently at AUD 21.1 billion.
Approximately 2/3 of the platform, or the real estate platform, is weighted towards unlisted funds, the balance comprising three listed REITs. Our unlisted real estate is supported by an extensive distribution network and complemented by expanding institutional investment partnerships. The group has maintained key stakes in Centuria's REITs, in our joint venture partnerships, and our institutional mandates, as well as our open-ended unlisted funds. Turning to slide six. As of 31 June 2024, our group AUM rose to AUD 21.1 billion, 96% of which comprised real estate funds. Our alternative real estate funds expanded, with real estate finance increasing 46% to AUD 1.9 billion, and agriculture increasing 21% to approximately AUD 640 million.
These alternatives attracted AUD 1.15 billion of capital inflows across our unlisted funds, including AUD 550 million from wholesale and retail investors, and AUD 600 million from offshore institutions. During the year, we executed AUD 2.3 billion of transactional activity, including AUD 1.3 billion of acquisitions and real estate finance transactions, together with AUD 1 billion of divestments and real estate finance repayments. As you'll be aware, this activity was transacted in a challenging operating market. Unsurprisingly, capital management remained a key focus during FY 2024. It's pleasing to report that group operating gearing reduced to 12.1%. Property remains a long-term investment, which is why we look to generate future returns for security holders. Accordingly, we've identified a AUD 2.2 billion development pipeline, almost half of which is weighted to the strongly performing industrial sectors.
Development projects aim to provide underlying assets for both our listed and unlisted funds. Centuria uses its balance sheet to support select investment opportunities, including corporate acquisitions, particularly in alternative markets, characterized by strong tailwinds and limited competition. During the period, we increased our investment in Centuria Bass to 8%, and we began FY 2025 with a 50% stake in liquid immersion cooling edge data center provider, Reset Data. I'll come back to this. My pleasure to confirm Centuria has delivered within its FY 2024 earnings guidance range, with a final operating earnings per security of AUD 0.117, and a full year distribution of AUD 0.10 per security. Moving to slide seven. During the period, Centuria's real estate platform continued to grow organically, with both real estate equity and real estate finance transactions.
In particular, our unlisted platform grew across both equity and credit funds. The latter including 23 new single asset vehicles, two diversified wholesale funds, and our first real estate, New Zealand real estate finance offering, which was oversubscribed. Equity funds expanded with our open-ended agricultural fund, CAF, attracting new investment following the acquisition of two high-quality glasshouse assets. The single-asset Halls Head Central Wholesale Fund was also heavily oversubscribed. To capture countercyclical opportunities and the increased appetite from wholesale investors, the Australian Select Opportunities Fund and the Centuria New Zealand Value Add Fund No. 2, were both successfully launched. Complementing these inflows was institutional capital from U.S. private investment firm, Starwood Capital , who committed a AUD 500 million industrial mandate, the Last Mile Logistics Partnership. Additionally, global bank UBS provided an initial AUD 100 million senior secured commitment for a new loan warehouse facility to support our Centuria Bass real estate credit business.
Centuria's corporate acquisition activity continues to provide a runway for future fund and profit growth. Our increased interest in Centuria Bass reflects an FY 2024 earnings multiple of approximately 4x, taking into account total acquisitions costs for our 80% interest. Looking ahead, in a similar fashion, we anticipate ResetData, be accretive from FY 2026 onward. Slide eight. Throughout the past five years, Centuria has demonstrated continuous growth. In the past year, we have maintained the size of our assets under management, which is a meaningful feat in the current operating environment. It underlines the relevance and foresight in having a diversified platform by real estate sector, fund type, investor profile, geographic reach, and sources of income. For example, our early entry into the real estate credit market has been one very instrumental factor in this regard.
Turning to slide nine, growth and alternatives. Looking more closely at alternative assets, more than 20% of the group's real estate platform has now weighted to alternative assets, which have collectively increased AUM by AUD 4.2 billion since 2019. This increase includes more than AUD 3 billion of organic growth, and is supported by strong investment appetite from institutional capital and private investors alike. Slide ten, Centuria Bass. Non-bank private credit tailwinds continue to be elevated in this high interest rate environment. Since Centuria's initial investment in Centuria Bass, its AUM has increased more than sixfold, and the compound annual growth rate of its operating profit has risen 92% to AUD 24.7 million. Centuria Bass is a good example of the embodiment of the group's M&A strategy or philosophy.
That is, securing an early mover advantage in the alternative sector, benefit from strong tailwinds, limited competition, and most importantly, has the ability to scale significantly on an ongoing fashion. Slide 11, I want to talk about ResetData a little more. So our most recent corporate acquisition. So recently, we secured a 50% investment in new generation, data server provider, ResetData. This group utilizes liquid immersion cooling technology to create edge data centers that are within existing office buildings, rather than traditional out-of-city air-cooled facilities. The ResetData deal is real estate-based, as it provides a contemporary solution to solve for the data storage and cloud requirements of office tenants.
Our interest in ResetData allows us to be at the forefront of this new technology, unlocking revenue stream potential for our managed office assets, as well as unlocking a new OpCo vertical for CNI, which we believe will grow to be a meaningful component of group revenue. Moving to slide 12, ESG. We continue to progress our new sustainability framework and set targets. On the environmental front, we delivered Centuria New Zealand's first XRB climate-related disclosures. These are coming for Australia in 2027 , and I can assure everyone on the line that a lot of work is associated with it. We commenced electrification across 50,000 sq m of COF portfolio, reducing gas and diesel reliance.
Towards the equivalent of 100% renewable energy across our corporate offices, reducing our greenhouse gas emissions, and installed 1,125 kW solar systems across our real estate platform. On a social front, our Centurions volunteered 450 hours in the community and raised more than AUD 112,000 for charities. Significantly, approximately nine out of 10 Centurions would recommend our company as a great place to work. It's also my pleasure to confirm that female representation across Centuria's board members has risen 43%. I believe we have the only female listed fund manager in the country, and we have recently promoted one of our in-house ladies as National Facilities Manager. Not quite a first, but a very rare opportunity, and one we were very pleased to take.
Finally, on the governance front, Centurians have completed more than 9,000 hours of training across compliance, cyber security, risk, and safety, and we're looking to release our next sustainability report in November. Slide 13, vision and execution. Being a leading Australasian real estate funds manager remains our principal vision, executing attractive core and alternative property and credit investment opportunities for both new and existing distribution networks, as well as institutions. We will focus on further scaling our alternative vehicles to unlock income streams, new income streams, and provide really a clear point of difference for investors, for our platform, and compelling returns for our security holders. Centuria benefits from an experienced management team who maintain a disciplined, strategic approach to capital management, with the aim of continuing our upward growth trajectory as financial markets stabilize. Slide 14.
Centuria provides guidance at levels that reflect our best estimate of earnings based on prevailing market conditions. We provide FY 2025 operating guidance, EPS guidance of AUD 0.12 per security, and distribution guidance of AUD 0.104 per security. I'll now hand you over to our Chief Financial Officer, Simon Holt, who will walk you through our financial results.
Thanks, John, and good morning, everyone. Slide 16 shows our statutory and operating earnings and distributions for the full year, as well as guidance for the 2025 financial year. I am pleased to report that despite the prevailing inflationary and interest rate pressures in the market of 2024, the group delivered a full-year statutory net profit after tax of AUD 102.2 million, and an operating NPAT of AUD 94.7 million. This translated to an operating EPS of AUD 0.117 per security, within our FY 2024 guidance range of AUD 0.115-AUD 0.12.
This solid operating performance delivered a full year distribution of AUD 0.10 per stapled security, which is also in line with guidance, and demonstrate the underlying quality of earnings, with operating cash flows for the year exceeding the group's reported operating net profit after tax. Looking into FY 2025, both our operating earnings guidance of AUD 0.12 per security and our distribution guidance of AUD 0.104 per security, does represent an increase on FY 2024, and underscores our continued confidence in the resilience and earnings potential of the group. Moving to slide 17, which outlines the key components of our operating earnings. Operating profits attributable to our property funds management segment reduced by AUD 7.5 million, primarily due to lower fees from subdued transaction markets and adjustments attributable to lower property valuations.
This decline in property valuations, combined with several fund term extensions during the year, has resulted in AUD 6 million of recognized performance fees. The group has also collected AUD 6 million in performance fee cash during that period as well, and based on property valuations, latent unrecognized performance fees of AUD 112 million were noted at the FY 2024 period end. The co-investment operating segment, prior to the impact of fair market valuations, delivered an operating result before tax of AUD 54 million, up AUD 1.6 million compared with the prior year. This reflected an increase in earnings sourced from the balance sheet support extended to the fast-growing Centuria Bass business, as an example of how active recycling and redeployment of capital in support of our business lines can contribute to operating earnings resilience in our platform.
Development net earnings decreased to AUD 1.2 million, primarily due to a decline in the number of active projects and a number of existing projects completing in the first half of FY 2024. It is important to note that despite this lower segment profitability, the group continues to utilize its in-house development capability across other refurbishment initiatives, and in supporting Centuria Bass Credit through its due diligence processes. As a real estate fund manager, Centuria continues to selectively bring online development opportunities at appropriate times, that will provide new generation properties for our underlying funds. Centuria's development business is well-positioned to contribute to future profitability of the group, and has benefited from the addition of AUD 1 billion of industrial projects being added to the group's future pipeline during FY 2024. Moving on to the property and development finance segment.
This segment contributed AUD 13.4 million in operating profitability for the year, and represents an uplift in excess of 100% compared with the prior year. The increase in profitability reflects the continued growth in AUM, increasing to AUD 1.9 billion during the year, as well as the increase in the group's ownership stake from 50% to 80%, as announced in April 2024. The growth in the business of AUM is reflective of growing investor appetite for well-sourced real estate finance investment products, along with the group's active management, distribution capability, and select balance sheet support over time. The investment bond management segment continues to consistently contribute to the operating profitability of the group, delivering an operating profit of AUD 3.6 million.
This increased profitability reflects improved inflows from across segments, recently expanded product offerings, as well as improved investment market and increasing AUM. The group's reported corporate overhead have remained largely in line with the prior year, increasing AUD 0.8 million due to an expansion of the group's compliance and risk management resources, as well as the impact of ongoing inflationary impacts. Moving to the group's finance costs, which decreased to AUD 32.6 million for FY 2024. This has been a noteworthy achievement and was a result of ongoing active management across the group's loan book, despite the higher interest rate environment that has experienced several rate increases over recent periods.
Finally, the noted decline in operating tax expense from AUD 18.1 million in FY 2023 to AUD 9 million for the current year reflects a change in the relative percentage mix of earnings away from the group's taxed corporate structure, which was disproportionately impacted by lower performance fees and operating outcomes, as well as an increase in interest deductions associated with the higher funding costs on the group's cross staple loan balance. The combination of the P&L movements has resulted in the group delivering an operating earnings per security of AUD 0.115 for the period. Slide 18 outlines our transaction fee revenue mix across our diversified platform, including acquisition, financing, and underwriting, and sales fees.
Notwithstanding the backdrop of challenging economic conditions, the group has undertaken AUD 2.3 billion of total gross transactional activity for the year, including AUD 1.3 billion of gross real estate activity and AUD 1 billion in divestments and repayments. Although property transaction fees decreased as a result of the subdued nature of the current property transaction market, the decrease has been substantially offset by the increases in the group's earnings associated with the lending activity of Centuria Bass Credit. As I discussed earlier, our interest in the business increased from 50% to 80%, contributing AUD 13.4 million before tax to the operating earnings of the group.
This was achieved by additional financing of AUD 780 million extended to property developers, as well as successful completion of AUD 400 million in real estate financing from the prior years. Turning to the balance sheet. We're pleased to report that the group's operating balance sheet has remained resilient during the year, with net asset value per security increasing to AUD 1.79 per security, up from AUD 1.77 at 30 June 2023. As shown by the group's co-investment earnings for the year, Centuria continues to utilize its strong balance sheet to support the underlying business, with over AUD 280 million of cash realized from the sale and recycling of balance sheet assets during the year.
The operating gearing ratio of 12.1%, along with a balance sheet look-through gearing of 35.1, remains well within the group's tolerances and reflects our focus on capital management, while utilizing a flexible balance sheet to provide support to the business as required. This flexibility is further demonstrated by the extension of the group's revolving loan Note A to FY 2027, which adds to the group's total available cash and undrawn debt of AUD 266.5 million at the end of the year, and also during the year, the group fully repaid its FY 2025 debt facilities for AUD 29 million, and additionally negotiated two new loans for AUD 100 million that mature in FY 2029.
What is also important to note, our cash flow from operating activities is AUD 122.7 million for the year. This is demonstrating the quality of our earnings and the cash-generating capabilities of the group. Turning to slide 20. Centuria continues to recycle its sources of debt capital across the platform, which includes the recycling of existing exposures with supportive financiers. Through the course of FY 2024, variation and extensions of 40% of all funds has led to strong relationships and understanding of lender appetite. This includes refinancing 68% of the group's office platform, with positive outcomes and engagement from lenders. The group continues to actively manage debt across the platform to ensure optimal financing outcomes, demonstrated by the platform topping up its hedging profiles as market opportunities present themselves.
Pleasingly, the average margin across the group is 175 basis points. In addition, during the period, we note that three of our unlisted funds have recorded LVRs of close to 60%. These three funds represent approximately 1% of the group's overall platform, and we continue to actively manage outcomes for these funds. Centuria's remaining funds continue to operate within tolerance LVR ranges, and the group continues to stress test covenant headroom on a regular basis. We will continue to take a prudent approach to the early extension of debt maturities and taking tenor where possible. The duration matrices presented here will shorten over time, in line with funds, various fund strategies and term maturities we oversee today. Now, moving to slide 21.
Our co-investments in interests in Centuria's underlying funds continues to be a strategic focus of the group, with AUD 675 million capital invested in financial assets and interest in associates or JVs at the end of the year. AUD 419 million, or 62% of this capital, is invested in our listed vehicles, CIP, COF, and Asset Plus, aligning CNI as the single largest unitholder in each of these funds. It should be noted that these interests are carried at simple investments, marked to the spot price of each fund at the balance date, as opposed to the respective NTA of each fund. Of the remaining capital deployed as part of the co-investment segment, approximately 30% has been deployed across certain retail and wholesale funds, with a further 7% across institutional partnerships.
The group will continue to utilize its balance sheet to selectively support establishment of new and existing funds, or align with certain capital partners as a means to grow our funds management platform through normal course of business. This is further demonstrated through the recycling of balance sheet assets, and since the start of FY 2023, the group has realized and redeployed in excess of AUD 500 million. Now, just to spend a little bit more time on Centuria's investment in ResetData, and talking a little bit about the data center ecosystem, so that we get a bit of a clearer picture of the opportunity this presents to us as a business. As John mentioned earlier, Centuria is implementing a unique dual PropCo and OpCo approach to delivering its edge data center strategy.
This slide illustrates the symbiotic relationship between the PropCo and OpCo strategies, with each representing an essential component of the value chain in Centuria's edge liquid immersion-cooled data center ecosystem. This value chain, enabled through the ResetData acquisition, will leverage latent access to the electricity grid and underutilized real estate office spaces, providing an alternative for capital-intensive, traditional air-cooled data centers. This strategy is expected to deliver a lower latency for customers, offering bespoke hardware stack at a proprietary cloud platform. Also of note are the ResetData active partnerships, which include the likes of Dell, NVIDIA, Submer, and UNICOM Engineering, which are complemented with original equipment manufacturer or OEM, OEM licensing for its liquid immersion cooling technology. And moving on to slide 23.
This slide really outlines the benefits which Centuria's integrated liquid immersion technology will deliver as a low-cost alternative to traditional air-cooled data centers. Of note is the integrated nature of the liquid cooling technology, which will be implemented, allowing the capture and recycling of heat generated by these servers in providing building amenities, including heating and structure. This, along with the noted decrease in energy consumption, in addition to reduced hardware and lifetime failure rates, will significantly reduce costs, as well as improvements, improved sustainability metrics for our tenants and data service customers. I'll now hand over to John, who'll take you through CNI's divisional highlights.
Thanks, Simon. Turning to slide 25. This slide outlines our seven real estate vehicles. These make up a AUD 20 billion real estate platform. And I think our platform diversification shows clear it's across core and alternative real estate sectors, and we think this distinguishes us from our peers. Moving to slide 26. A third of our real estate platform is weighted to the office sector, largely within near city and metropolitan markets, in addition to the Perth CBD. These are predominantly modern buildings that provide significant sustainability credentials, and are well located near transport hubs. 40% of our total office net lettable area was leased during FY 2024, more than 105,000 sq m of high-quality office.
This is testimony to the strength of Centuria's active in-house management and indicative of the demand for prime, younger assets. Also, throughout the period, Centuria refinanced AUD 1.7 billion of debt across our office assets, which accounts for 68% of that vertical. Through further proactive capital management, we divested AUD 154 million of non-core offices, with proceeds largely used to reduce debt. These divestments, along with cap rate movements, so our office portfolio declined by AUD 8.7 billion-AUD 6.7 billion . Our office assets collectively provided 6.6% weighted average cap rate, a robust 4.1-year WALE, and an average 90% occupancy.
Centuria aims to address some of this vacancy through ResetData's edge data centers, which can fit within existing office templates and provide the ability to generate significantly higher rental income, compared with typical office occupants. Our first edge data center is committed and anticipated at 818 Bourke Street in Melbourne's Docklands. Turning to industrial on slide 27. Our industrial platform increased to AUD 6 billion during the period, accounting for approximately a third of the real estate platform. Industrial sector benefits from persistent tailwinds, enabling Centuria to lease more than 348,000 sq m during FY 2024. In particular, our pure play industrial fund, CIP, achieved record average re-leasing spreads of 42% during the period. These spreads refer to the difference in rental income from an expired lease and a new lease on the same property.
Across our industrial platform, almost a fifth of leases expire in the next two years, providing further opportunities to capture positive rent reversions, resulting in strong occupied demand and limited supply. To further capture sector tailwinds and continuous occupied demand, our in-house development team has identified a AUD 1 billion industrial development pipeline, which it aims to deliver throughout a five-year period. As mentioned earlier, encouraging sector fundamentals attract further institutional capital, Starwood committing to a AUD 500 million mandate, of which 30% has been allocated. Centuria's industrial efforts collectively provide a high 98% occupancy, a strong 6.9-year WALE, and a 5.95% weighted average cap rate. Turning to retail on slide 28. Our retail vertical focuses on large format retail and daily needs retail, which continue to provide compelling tailwinds.
More than 93,000 sq m were leased across these sectors during the period, achieving average re-leasing spreads of 5%. In particular, large format assets provide a collective 98% occupancy, a four-year WALE, and a 6.19% weighted average cap rate. Daily needs assets provide a 97% occupancy, a 5.8- year WALE, and a 6.3% weighted average cap rate. Total retail AUM increased during the period to AUD 3.2 billion. However, AUD 112 million of divestments were executed to reduce debt and improve the overall quality of the underlying portfolio. Turning to real estate finance on slide 29. Centuria Bass continued to scale its business during FY 2024, with two diversified wholesale funds and more than 135 loan originations successfully launched.
Our early investment in the real estate private credit sector has helped capture non-bank finance tailwinds in the domestic property middle market, which has limited competition. The AUD 100 million senior secured commitment from UBS broadened capital sources beyond the wholesale investor market, and we anticipate further institutional commitments as the private credit sector gains momentum. At the UBS, as a financing partner, assists Centuria Bass, providing finance on short-term loans less than 24 months. This team will continue to focus on the often overlooked middle market real estate finance sector, and its loan book comprises largely of first-tier finance, with a weighting to the residential sector. Turning to healthcare on slide 30. Our healthcare property platform was presented with a challenging operating environment during FY 2024, and affected by wider sector challenges within Australia's healthcare sector.
Centuria has a AUD 320 million committed healthcare property development pipeline, that's geographically dispersed across Australia. Within it, are developments for Centuria Prime Partnership, an institutional partnership between Centuria and a vehicle sponsored by Morgan Stanley Real Estate Investing. Healthcare AUM was impacted by Cap Rate movements, along with more than AUD 160 million of non-core divestments. These divestments included non-core properties, as well as underlying assets within funds reaching their full term. However, Centuria Healthcare remains committed to real estate that delivers efficient, sustainable models of care, and during the period, over 10,500 sq m was leased. Our healthcare assets are underpinned by very robust tenant covenants, with 88% of leases being net or triple net, meaning maintenance and associated maintenance expenditure remains the responsibility of the operator.
Furthermore, 43% of leases are CPI linked. Collectively, our healthcare real estate assets provide a healthy 97% occupancy, a strong 10.7-year WALE, and a 5.95% weighted average cap rate. Agriculture on slide 31. Again, another example of early mover advantage in the protected cropping agricultural real estate. This has provided a platform. This platform has significant growth as this vertical continues to scale with limited peer competition. The acquisition of P'Petual South Australia glasshouse and the Katunga Fresh glasshouse in Victoria, and a further glasshouse in New Zealand, contributed to AUM increasing to circa AUD 640 million. All agricultural assets are backed by long-term net and triple net leases, ensuring limited expense for the funds.
Our agricultural assets provide a collective 13.3-year WALE, 100% occupancy, and a 6.3% weighted average cap rate. Unrelenting demand for fresh produce, driven by Australia and New Zealand's rising population and expanding Asian demand, provides incredibly strong tailwinds for sustainable agricultural real estate, and we will continue to build this vertical. Discussing unlisted property on slide 32. As mentioned, 2/3 of our real estate funds are weighted to the unlisted sector. This slide illustrates the diversification, breadth, and range of our unlisted platform by capital sources, by fund type, and real estate sector. Our unlisted funds service more than 14,000 investors, with a growing percentage from the institutional sector. Significantly, over 1/3 of our unlisted funds have no expiry date, providing opportunities delivered through market funds management.
Centuria's unlisted platform continues to provide security holders with ongoing performance fees, and despite FY 2024 presenting difficult operating conditions, Centuria has generated AUD 1.5 million of unlisted capital inflows, an often overlooked fundamental strength of the Centuria platform. These legacy investors continue to invest in Centuria products, while traditional equity sources dried up for other fund managers. Finally, let's turn to slide 33 and our REITs. Centuria actively manages Australia's largest listed pure-play industrial and office REITs. As mentioned, Centuria Industrial, CIP, accelerated its re-leasing spreads 42% across over 300,000 sq m of leasing and announced a AUD 1 million development pipeline. Capital management initiatives saw CIP divest AUD 120 million of non-core assets and hedge 93% of its debt. It delivered gearing at 34.5%, with no debt expiring before FY 2026.
CIP maintained 97% occupancy and a 7.6-year WALE across its portfolio of 89 assets, worth AUD 3.9 billion. Centuria Office REIT, COF, divested 4 non-core properties at or near prevailing book values, using proceeds to repay debt. COF retains strong liquidity with AUD 862 million of debt refinanced and no debt expiring before FY 2028. COF recorded a balanced gearing at 41.3% and with hedged 63 points, with 63% hedged as at June 2024. The office REIT portfolio comprises of 19 high-quality assets worth AUD 2.2 billion, a 4.3-year WALE, a 93% occupancy, and most importantly, in the current idiom, an average age of 17 years, so not too many old boilers. That concludes the formal presentation. I'll now hand back to the operator to commence Q&A.
Thank you for dialing into today's presentation.
Thank you. If you wish to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. If you wish to cancel your request, please press star two. If you're on a speakerphone, please pick up the handset to ask your question. A reminder to please limit your questions to two per person. Your first question comes from Steven Tjia with Barrenjoey. Please go ahead.
Morning, John and Simon. Thanks for your time this morning. Could you please talk us through some of the key drivers of the guidance, you know, things like performance fees and development management fees for 2025?
Yeah, look, there's, I mean, there's a couple of small elements. I mean, I think from a performance fee point of view, it's relatively flat. It might be a little bit higher for 2025. We've got our view is probably in excess of 20% EBIT growth in the property and development finance, so the Centuria Bass business. And so the other element to that is probably on the transaction side, still a bit subdued, but I think, hopefully, given the recent market changes in interest rates and forward-looking hedges, could be a good opportunity.
Thanks. Yeah, maybe just on private credit, you know, how equity inflows kind of tracking into FY 2025 and, you know, expectations for AUM to Centuria about 725.
Well, I think AUM, thanks for that question, Steven. I think AUM, it's slightly more difficult business to measure by AUM. I mean, it's grown pretty spectacularly to AUD 1.9 billion. And we've made a statement that we think that the EBIT will grow to at least 20%. So I think that's more guidance than we've given in the past. But where its AUM will actually end up, it clearly will be higher than AUD 1.9 billion. We're not proposing it double, because you know, these terms are relatively short. You know, we don't need it. We don't want our loans out forever. We want them coming back. So they're like really short property syndicates, if you like, whereas our property syndicates tend to last for years and years.
These will last for, you know, 18 months or two years. But, you know, look, so not quite doubling, perhaps something like that.
Okay, great. Thanks for that.
Thank you. Your next question comes from Simon Chan with Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.
Oh, good day, guys. Hey, John and Simon, now that the cash has gone out the door and you've paid for ResetData, I was wondering if you’ve thought about a little bit more - like, you've signed 600 m of lease in 818. Just wondering, have you guys thought about what the potential is across your Centuria office platform? Like, realistically, you know, how many meters could you be leasing to these, you know, edge data center-type equivalent?
Thanks for the question, Simon. How are you? Firstly, we thought about it a lot before the money went out the door, not after, and look, we're reviewing the portfolio, portfolios at the moment. Within our portfolio, I'm pretty sure Jason told me there were between 12 and 14 properties that we thought looked immediately suitable. To be suitable, would depend on their geographic location, most importantly, their unutilized potential, electrical load, electrical power supply. So, out of all the portfolio, they're the ones who came to attention straight away. That does not mean that there will be other properties within the portfolios that will be suitable, where we can gain extra supply from the energy providers.
But our intention is not to limit our inquiry or potential marketing just through our portfolio. We think our reputation in the market, which has been built over 30 years as business founders, and our relationships with the other portfolio managers, is good enough that we believe we can approach a lot of other landlords. We've received significant onstream inquiry because where there's power potential, untapped power potential exists. I mean, this will be an obvious REIT for us. You know, the data center, the data storage requirement in Australia is demonstrably growing over 30% per annum, but it looks like supply is under 6% per annum. And anyone who thinks that AI and chat won't continue with explosive growth really isn't reading the, you know, isn't reading a laptop.
So look, and combine all that with the fact that, you know, we know NVIDIA aren't designing any more new chips for air-cooled data centers, simply because the heat loads off these chips are just too high to be cooled by air. You know, we don't think that, we're certainly not suggesting that any participants globally in the data center market are defunct. Not at all. We're just saying no one's really thought of concentrating on people who require very high data density, want to operate these brand-new chips. Every chip from now on is gonna be hotter and hotter and can fit these far closer to their operations. So anyone that's in graphics, design, trading, and then the cloud is effectively coming back into the server room.
So I won't go on any further, 'cause if you start Simon Holt, he could give, he'd give you an hour on it.
Yeah. Okay. So, I'll just move on to my next question then. Thanks for that, John.
Hey, I'll make them faster, shorter.
Early in your presentation, you mentioned you raised AUD 1.15 billion of capital during the year, but half of which is instead of capital, et cetera. What about, t hat's a gross number, w hat about outflows? What were the outflows during the year, and which sort of platforms were they on?
There's really only two funds which have outflows. As you know, we've answered this question so many times, but not suggesting it's inappropriate to ask it, but they're our diversified funds, and I don't know if we've got the number of outflows on them?
Somewhere between 6% and 10% for each.
Yeah, 6% and 10%. So that's our healthcare diversified fund and our, what we call our diversified fund, which is principally office with some.
Industrial.
Some industrial. I think the healthcare fund, at the last quarterly test for its limited redemption facility, is stuck on 14%, and over half of that's one ongoing legacy investor who's just wanting to convert to REITs. And the healthcare, the other REIT, the other diversified fund is stuck at 6%, I think, which we don't think is that high, to be honest with you.
Yeah, the other one. Are they millions, millions of dollars, John or Simon? Like, in terms of millions, like, like, how much does that equate to?
Simon, we can get that figure to you, but it's not a very big figure.
Okay. Okay. Good to know.
Yeah. I'll get Tim to get it to you.
That's all right. Thanks, guys. Cheers.
Thank you.
Thanks, Simon.
Your next question comes from Solomon Zhang with JP Morgan. Please go ahead.
Morning, John and Simon. Thanks for your time. Just one question around the net tangible asset backing. Just looking at Appendix 4E, it fell quite significantly, half and half, down AUD 0.28 or 36%. I understand there is some fair value movements impacting that, but it is a big move. Could you just help us reconcile why that half-and-half move was so large?
The reason the net asset value has gone up is as a result of buying Bass. In terms of the net asset number going down, that's an outcome, 'cause whilst we report it, you know, we're very focused on the net asset value and where that position is at. And we have obviously grown the issuance of equity has delivered also, as a result, the intangible number. So you've got more units on issue, so your NTA will come down, but it is really the acquisition of Bass that's playing out in that conversation.
Gotcha. And maybe just generally, just a comment on the demand for investment in office assets, whether that be opportunistic or otherwise, and when you're expecting this to recover. Is the risk/reward there for retail, wholesale, institutional capital, or what are they waiting for?
Yeah, look, everyone's got a different opinion on this. Look, I think firstly, our comment on the office markets in Australia is, firstly, their performance since COVID, I think, has been better than we might have expected. You know, we're sitting in COF, 92% leased, 92.5% leased, and just leased over 100,000 sq m. So our problem hasn't been so much with people wanting to occupy offices and renew leases in offices, well, not even rent growth in most of the centers. There's a couple of pockets in the country we've got problems with. One would be Docklands, out of Victoria, generally, I think is very, very slow to recover, but we don't have a massive AUM footprint there.
So I think in terms of performance, like hardcore performance metrics, like I've been in real estate over 30 years, I would think a normal, healthy, office occupancy stat would be 95%. So we're 2.5% off that. I think it's a flesh wound, but the more important wound is the global sentiment towards office. And this isn't always capable of being supported by some sort of performance metric. And it's so pleasing to see just in the last few weeks, and before I go on to the sentiment over the last few weeks, I've listened to a lot of commentators, all my other friends in the marketplace, and talking about old boilers, and, you know, we'd have one of the youngest office portfolios in the whole country.
You know, I'm sitting in an office block that's 35 years old. It's supposed to be a pretty good office block, Chifley Tower. And, you know, our office blocks are not old, and apart from the Perth CBD, where we do have quite a few CBD buildings, generally, we love playing in the decentralized area. You know, we love playing in the Eveleigh-type locations. So, in terms of sentiment, I think you've seen a big turn, I think, in the last couple of months with the New South Wales Government asking its staff to just please come back to work. And also, there's no question, certainly in Sydney, the Sydney CBD, the activity levels and physical occupancy levels have been great.
And I think Belinda described it really well in some of her interviews with COF. You know, I think people who run these offices want to get everyone in. They're now finding some of the real harm that's been done by people refusing to come into the office at all. It's impossible to have a culture. It's impossible to get your interns aligned with your philosophies. And you know, I think it's settled down. So in terms of where that will impact values, and we're cautious about FY 2025. You're seeing cash rates coming down in New Zealand.
I can go, I won't go on too much, but, you know, I was amazed to see term deposit rates from our friendly banks, you know, who we've got great relationships with, dropping immediately in Australia, you know, with, we don't know what the prospect for cash rate reductions are in Australia. So there is a, there's gonna be a big turn in sentiment, and if someone asks a question about New Zealand, I'll, I'd actually love to tell you what's happening in New Zealand right now with cash rates falling.
Thanks. Maybe to just ask the question another way, are you actually deploying in your opportunistic funds that you've raised? Are you actually deploying in office right now, selectively?
In the FY 2024, we didn't, but we've got a couple of people concentrating, particularly in institutional capital, and we're seeing a growing interest and demand from them, waiting for that moment to occur. The problem is, it's getting back to what I tried to answer your question before. If the metrics and the performance and the huge discounts that were supposed to be there, based on those global sentiment, had presented cheap offices, our company and all our competitors would've been in there buying thousands of them. The values just didn't drop that much, you know, and not enough to make them, you know, very compelling as they were during the GFC, for example, where we bought three or four CBD office buildings.
Anyone who's covered us for more than 10 years will know what we were able to do with them. We had IRRs that were more than double digit. They were, you know, triples.
Thanks for that. Appreciate it. Cheers.
Thank you. Your next question comes from Caleb Wheatley with Macquarie. Please go ahead.
Good morning, John, Simon, and team. First question from me, just around the unlisted AUM growth, more than 50% of that has some expiry post five years. But for those that haven't expired within five years, can you just talk to any key expiries and early thoughts on being able to either extend or potential for wind up on those, please?
Yeah. Thanks for the question, Caleb. We as a group, what we find, our unlisted funds, the termination clauses vary, depending on what geography you're in. So in New Zealand, there is no expiry at all, because that's just how they run that. In Perth, when we bought Primew est, they just traded and extended all their funds by 10 years, so they've got a lot to run. In the rest of the country, we'd probably have things like a five- or a seven-year term, with a two-year extension.
In the current climate, where we believe that it wouldn't be advantageous to crystallize an asset, we'd advise the investors of that, and in almost all cases, it's very hard for me to remember a single case over thirty years, where they wouldn't accept that advice. Occasionally, if something comes to an absolute terminal end, and we have no choice but to sell it, then what happens is we would offer it for sale. But even then, if the offer that's received isn't considered advantageous for security holders, the asset won't be sold, and it'll be held until a more advantageous price is secured.
There is no sword of Damocles, there is no flat Earth that we're gonna sail off the end of, and I think that's one of the things that's been proven actually, during this post-COVID period, is when we looked at sources of capital have dried up, like institutional capital, like the ability to raise capital on the equity capital markets, the one thing. Yeah, not only have we not been worried about people terminating our unlisted funds, we've been raising capital in that market. Those investors have forgotten to stop investing. They just keep going.
Maybe to narrow the question, doesn't sound like it, but is there any known expiries that will come in the next 12 months?
Oh, look, with a portfolio of 120 unlisted funds, yeah, 140, I should say, yeah, you could expect there's probably 10 or so that might come up in the next financial period. But, if they demonstrate good performance compared to their acquisition price, and we believe that the initial security holders to sell them, we will. If not, we'll advise that they're turned over or rolled over.
Okay, great. Thank you.
We have far more flexibility than. Look, we have far, far more flexibility, and our relationship with our investors is so much closer than you might imagine. And I know it's difficult. You know, don't forget, this is a founder-led business, where two people have been building this business for 30 years, and we know these investors, we know their children, we know their wives, their husbands. If they're dead, we know who runs the deceased estate. You know, they're actually looking to us for advice on what to do with a major asset, and that they do not want to squander their money and sell when it's an inappropriate time.
Got it. Thank you. And just my final question, just a broader comment, if you can, on asset values across the portfolio. Conscious there was a fairly modest move over the second half of the year. But just would be keen to get your thoughts on how you're thinking about revaluations, in office and industrial, and then the broader real estate platform, please.
Look, I think as a group, I think we've seen the end of, you know, wholesale valuation decreases. I mean, the valuers, I think, have been pretty responsible, as have the banks. Certainly, perhaps in, yeah, in the hated office sector, like maybe some fund managers are holding really old properties that, you know, that are unleased and will never be leased. You have more pressure on. You know, I think if I look at COF at 92.5% leased, I don't think there's a lot of over-renting. I'd be very surprised, but it'll depend a little bit on exactly what happens in Australia.
You know, I, you know, we're hoping that after every country in the developed world starts decreasing their cash rates and controls inflation, that at some point Australia will catch up to that, as an idiom, and that will be very supportive, sort of stabilizing office values. I think they're pretty stable. That would just give us a little bit more confidence in that area. I know that when we're looking at forecasting within our office portfolios and looking at office opportunities, you know, if you, you know, a couple of things have happened here in Australia, is like swap rates, if you look in the swap curve, people have been hedging like crazy.
The feasibilities for acquiring office blocks to try and find something where you can add value to have become much easier in the last couple of weeks, you know? So there's no doubt that the financial markets and interest rate curve is more attractive to induce us. So when everyone is more capable of having a positive spread when they're acquiring all assets, and offices included in that, that's supportive of people who hold offices, because they have the same spread issue. So yeah, it's happening slowly, but when the cash rates actually start toppling, I think that will be really helpful. You know, in New Zealand, they're looking at having another basically a hundred points of reductions before Christmas. That's pretty major.
You've already seen term deposit rates drop 40-80 basis points in Australia, just in sympathy, and that's incredibly supportive for our unlisted business. You can imagine us, you know, we're now more easy to provide, at a lower swap rate, a higher return for our funds. And the relative return of the fund, compared to simply having the money in cash, makes that exacerbates that delta. So that's exactly the sort of thing we've been waiting for. So yeah, we're all pretty happy in here. Sorry, that was another long answer.
That's great. I appreciate the call. Thank you.
Yep.
Thank you. Your next question comes from Tom Bodor with UBS. Please go ahead.
Morning, John and Simon. Just two very quick ones from me. Retail investor appetite, you touched on it with the cash, with term deposit rates coming down. How have fund flows been, and have you seen any notable pickup since the sort of movement on rates?
It only came down a few days ago, Tom. Good morning, Tom. It only came down a few days ago. In fact, I think it was two days ago. I think. I'm pleased you asked the question. Where we've seen a more immediate reaction is in New Zealand. In New Zealand, where they dropped 25 basis points off their cash rate, but you know, they were higher, and term deposit rates started tumbling. We started getting a lot of retail feedback within New Zealand. A little bit too early for Australia at the moment. As I said, it's just a bit. I think the banks only notified 48 hours ago. Is that correct? 72 hours ago, but you can guarantee.
50 to, well, 50-100 basis points be enough, or does it need to be more meaningful to get real pickup in flows from retail investors?
Look, I think just a bit more time. I think what will happen, Tom, is what people get the idea, in fact, you know, I'm not an economist, but at some point, as I said, Australia will, let's hope it isn't, but it could be the only country in the southern hemisphere, the developed world, that hasn't reduced its cash rate, right? Because of inflation, but it'll happen, and when it starts happening, it's the sentiment that surrounds it. It'll be the 25 pips, then all the newspapers will start talking about the next 25 and the next 25, and of course, the banks have been incredibly patient and very good to deal with over this last period. You know, they'll be protecting themselves by dropping term deposit rates.
That's already started happening. The curve's happening. I'd, you know, I'm. It's just if we had a retail offer right there right now, a brand new one, it'd be a little bit easier to ask, but I guarantee. I mean, the last retail offer we had for a property equity fund was Halls Head Central. And I think we raised AUD 42 million. It was like the old days, and it's almost like people could see these reductions coming. We had AUD 32 million of expressed interest in 48 hours, and we raised the AUD 42 million in five or six days. That's kind of how we've been running the business for 30 years until COVID. We're sort of kind of feeling, Tom, like we're getting out of jail, which is a good feeling.
I'm sure it is. Also, just transactions secured, but not settled. You used to provide a number there. Is there anything of note, or is it pretty limited at this point?
I think somewhere around AUD 160 million.
Just speak up so Tom.
Tom, Tom, there's AUD 160 million that's exchanged and to be settled in FY 2025.
Okay, great. Thank you.
Thanks, Tom.
Thank you. Your next question comes from James Druce with CLSA. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Good morning, John, Simon. I'll be quick. What should we be expecting for divestments this year across real estate firms? Around AUD 1 billion last year.
I mean, of the billion, there was 400 that are related to the Bass Credit side of it, so that's 40% of it, and we'll see, we'll see that and probably a bit more come through on that particular side of it. In terms of the property equity side of the business, look, it'll be, could be around the same, of the difference being 600 , it might be a little bit more. There are things that we're doing that we know that we're looking through investors to recycle some of those assets. Look, it'll be, it'll play out over the course of this year.
Yeah, okay. And just quickly, I just wanted to make sure I understood your comments before. You talked about putting some balance sheet capital to work for some new and established funds. I think you put a bit of money into Bass this year. What other options, what are you doing with the balance sheet capital for other established funds over the next 12 months?
Look, that's been. I mean, when we make that statement, like the one example that I give is the agricultural fund, where we're using our balance sheet in an established fund and to buy an asset and then to get that recycled back through further equity raise over time. That's probably the biggest one in that conversation, but, you know, we do that from time to time, but it's more about, it's still raising capital for a new asset, per se, that we're doing, as opposed to having to top up for funds that exist, which I think is where you were trying, potentially asking the question from.
Yeah, more not so much funds, supporting existing funds. We don't do that, but I think we're quite close to a couple of new institutional mandates, and they require, you know, a 5% or 10% co-investment, and we believe that's an appropriate allocation, you know, appropriate use of our balance sheet. It might not quite meet our internal rate of return for a capital-light fund manager, but, you know, if we're gonna play in that market, I think hopefully we have to respect the rules.
Okay, thank you.
Thanks, James.
Thank you. Your next question comes from Edward Day with Moelis Australia. Please go ahead.
Morning, John and Simon. Just a couple of quick ones. Firstly, on your credit book, are there any loans that are non-performing or, you know, I guess, on a watch list of potentially becoming non-performing?
Yeah. Good morning, Edward. Yeah, but I know you guys run a pretty big loan book yourselves. There'll always be a loan that's not performing. We have a traffic light system and, you know, green, amber, red, and how many loans we've got out at the moment?
Very few, very few that are in the amber, reds, but there, there's some, but you know, that is part of the business model we have, that we operate, so there's not a lot of. We don't have anything, in fact, in the accounts on the consolidation. We haven't impacted any capital or reduced even through the expected credit loss of any capital of any of those loans.
I think one of the benefits, Ed, Edward, of just being in the real estate market is we see a lot of the private credit participants suddenly just arrive on the market as if they're from outer space. You know, we're not sure if they know anything about the real estate market. So probably the amount of loans that we turn down might be higher than other people. And the area where that middle market area we play in, I would say, you know, Jason and I are both on that board. Simon's on its investment committee. Well, Simon's on this board as well. You know, we're asset lenders, aren't we?
Yeah.
It's really, that's the most important thing for us. You know, we don't wanna be in things where we have to walk away from them if there's an issue. We want sufficient headroom to be able to go and sort it out ourselves.
Thank you. That's clear. And just one more, if I may. Simon, in the past, I think you've provided an average LVR figure across your unlisted asset platform. Not, not look through, but just an average across the, the board there. Are you able to update as to what that is?
I don't actually think we've probably talked to it as opposed to just put in a presentation, but it'd be early 40s. It hasn't really changed too much. New Zealand's a bit lower, Perth's a bit higher, although at the moment, actually, it's sitting probably a little bit lower than even our unlisted, Eastern S eaboard assets, so early 40s.
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you. There are no further questions at this time. I'll now hand back to Mr. McBain for closing remarks.
Thanks, everybody, for tuning up, and if you've got any further questions, please call Tim Mitchell, and have a good day.
That does conclude our conference for today. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.