It's 1:30 exactly. I think without further ado, thank you all very much for being here today. It is a little bit of a déjà vu almost. It's exactly two years almost to the day. I think it was a Friday, today is a Thursday, but two years to the day that we were standing here delivering the half year results for the period up to December 2019. That was the Friday. On the Sunday we were still saying, "Okay, we're on track to make our distributions of ZAR 2.18." We were giving forecasts, and we were coming in with, like, literally to the second decimal.
That was on the Sunday evening, the president put the country into a state of disaster, and I think it was the Monday or the Tuesday, we went into lockdown level five. Man, how the world has changed. It's been a very, very rocky ride over the last sort of two years. We feeling a bit more positive about these results. I think, certainly, I think there are some positives to take from it. If nothing else, the fact that you are here in person is already a testament to the fact that things are normalizing. Last night, we were at the convention center. There were two functions going on. Ninety One, we're having a 30-year celebration. We had, I think Liberty had a two-day conference, which they were finishing up with a black-tie function.
There's no doubt things are feeling a lot more, a lot better. Things are feeling a lot more positive. I think our results probably also, you know, reflect, you know, some of that. I'm gonna go through the sections one to four of the agenda. Estienne is gonna do sections five, six, and seven. I'll come back to try and conclude and draw some concluding remarks. Starting off, as in the past, just touching on, you know, an update on some of the strategies. It's fair to say that the last two years or has been very much about focusing on balance sheet strength and liquidity, and in order for us to pursue our, you know, our goals and our strategies. We are continuing at the moment with our 80% payout ratio.
We're retaining about ZAR 524 million worth of cash. That's the equivalent of the 20% we're not paying out. At balance sheet date, we had ZAR 516 million of cash on the balance sheet, and we have over ZAR 6 billion worth of pre-committed approved facilities from our banking partners ready for drawdown in South Africa. On the internationalization front, I guess, a relatively quiet period. We invested a further ZAR 480 million into Capital & Regional, another 11 odd million rand or $700,000 into Lango. Approximately 43% of our assets today are effectively offshore, located offshore, and 28% of our earnings before interest and tax is earned offshore.
Looking at the South African portfolio, we continue to optimize and streamline the portfolio, selling non-core assets. During the six-month period, we sold ZAR 1 billion worth of assets, 19 assets in total, at a small profit to book. At balance sheet date, there were another three properties held for sale for ZAR 30-odd million, small industrial assets. We feel confident that between now and 30 June, we would be able to sell probably another ZAR 500-odd million, between ZAR 500 million and ZAR 1 billion worth of assets. Cumulatively, since FY 2017, we've sold ZAR 8.6 billion worth of assets. Looking at generating new revenue streams, we continue to make great strides with our Growthpoint Investment Partners strategy. That's sort of the new brand name that we've adopted for our fund management business.
We have circa ZAR 15 billion worth of assets under management now across those three funds, which is essentially what we set out to achieve when we started the funds management funds management strategy. We continue to see, you know, pretty good opportunities there to grow that even further. It is a capital-light strategy, and considering, you know, the cost of capital that we're faced with at the moment, we're finding that is very attractive in this current environment. Late last year, in December, we launched the student accommodation fund. In total, for the period six months, we've generated just over ZAR 20 million worth of fees. Then obviously we are you know, earning the income from the investments.
The whole premise and the whole model is premised on co-investment and hence the Growthpoint Investment Partners name that we've given that business. Trading and development for the six months generated trading profits of ZAR 43 million, development fees of ZAR 1.6 million, and net property income of just short of ZAR 33 million. This essentially relates to rental income earned on properties that the trading and development team have on their balance sheet. Touching on some of the salient features for the period, the SA REIT FFO grew 17.6% to ZAR 2.6 billion. The FFO per share grew 17.4% to ZAR 0.774.
The distributable income per share was up just over 5% to ZAR 0.769, and the distribution per share at 80% payout ratio, ZAR 0.615. Also just over 5% increase from the comparable prior period. Group property assets grew at 7.7% to ZAR 164.6 billion. Our LTV has remained at roughly the 40% mark, just a shade under group consolidated LTV. Our NAV grew by 6.2% to ZAR 21.48 net per share. Looking at the financial results and trying to unpack, I guess, what drove the 5% growth or ZAR 128 million-odd rand worth of increase in distributable income. In the first instance, South Africa actually was a negative contributor. About ZAR 68 million down net property income.
I mean, largely impacted by you know, the weak office environment. Still seeing negative reversions on lease renewals. The income line, you know, continues to be under pressure. On the expense line, obviously, significant improvement there with substantially less COVID relief that we had to provide, and also substantially lower amounts of bad debts that had to be provided for or written off. On the upside, on the finance line in the South African business, given the equity raise that we did in November last year, bulk of the proceeds were used to settle debt. We achieved about ZAR 124 million saving on interest, and that was one of the big positive contributors to the increase.
The V&A had a spectacular turnaround, and David and his team are here. Also, I'm sorry, I forgot right at the outset to just welcome, you know, some of our former directors. You know, Hugh Herman and Lynette Finlay are here today. Obviously, a lot of the Waterfront representatives are here as well today. Yeah, the Waterfront had a great turnaround, and ZAR 94 million improved contribution from the V&A Waterfront. It's, you know, I'll talk to that a little bit more when we get to the, you know, to the details. Distribution from GOZ was ZAR 32 million up, about a 4% growth in dividend from GOZ, and slightly lower dividend withholding tax. Globalworth, their dividend reduced from EUR 0.15 to EUR 0.13.
The bottom line of that is ZAR 36 million less contribution from Globalworth. Capital & Regional still not really contributing. Things are definitely looking better there, but still no dividend. I think they did in their results two weeks ago indicate that they would look to pay a dividend towards the end of the FY 2022 financial year for them. The next sort of five or six line items are all linked to the Growthpoint Investment Partners. These are either our direct stakes into the different funds and/or the management companies. Those all contributed positively or were quite smallish numbers. The last line item there refers to our trading and development, where compared to the prior period, we ZAR 52 million less.
That is due to the fact that, you know, in the prior period, we actually had pretty bulky disposal profit on disposal from the sale of the former Exxaro head office building in Pretoria. A very brief look at the income statement, just sort of extracts, if you want. Gross property income was down by 2.4% to ZAR 6.421 billion. Property expenses, I'm not gonna go through each one of them. I mean, you can see there the South Africa GOZ, Capital & Regional, the Healthcare Fund, the Student Resi Fund, and Trading and Development are all separately listed. In total, gross income was down 2.4%. Property expenses were 11.2% lower.
Expenses, you know, at the property level, I guess, also impacted by, again, bad debts, COVID relief, et cetera. Those numbers are looking a lot better. That leaves us with net property income up 1.3%, ZAR 4.684 billion. Other property expenses were up 27.8% to ZAR 418 million. At the bottom there, leaves us with net property income after operating expenses down 0.7% to ZAR 4.66 billion. Our finance costs were 6% lower, ZAR 1.64 billion of interest across the different entities. Finance and other income was 34.5% higher at ZAR 535 million.
After the adjustments for non-controlling interest, exchange control, foreign exchange profits and losses, LTV and dividends and tax, we're left with distributable income up 5.1% at ZAR 2.623 billion. Taking that distributable income and then translating that into SA REIT FFO, there are a number of company specific adjustments that are made to the numbers. In aggregate, they add about ZAR 12 million to the distributable income number. The SA REIT FFO number then comes in at ZAR 2.635 billion. That's 17.6% up on the prior comparable period. On a per share level, ZAR 0.774. Our distributable income per share is ZAR 0.769, and the dividend per share ZAR 0.615, so 5% up.
Brief look at the balance sheet and just a few extracts here. The total property portfolio asset values increased in total by 8.7%. ZAR 139.9 billion with the property assets. Again, you can see the individual movement of South Africa, GOZ, and Capital & Regional. I think this set of results has been characterized by two key sort of elements to understand. Certainly as it relates to the international investments, the year-end exchange rates, the rand was particularly weak, so the conversion at balance sheet date of the Aussie assets, the Capital & Regional assets, and Globalworth saw quite a significant increase into rands.
However, if you look at the income statement, if you look at the average exchange rate, we do have notes at the bottom of the page here. The average exchange rate for FY, this particular reporting period, half year 2022, was actually lower than the average exchange rate for the comparable period. You've got sort of two contrasting sort of impacts if you want. Income statement is showing lower average sort of conversion into rand. The balance sheet is showing a very elevated conversion into rand. Our equity investments up by about 1.3% to ZAR 15.2 billion. Loans granted up 22.5% to ZAR 3.1 billion.
That's mainly a dynamic as it relates to the V&A and accounting for the V&A loan that the Waterfront that Growthpoint has made to the V&A. Our listed investments grew by 77% to 1.992 billion, driven mainly by the increased investment that GOZ made into the Dexus Industria Fund. We have the unlisted investment in Lango at ZAR 852 million. Then our nominal borrowings up 6.6% at ZAR 64.5 billion. That leaves us with shareholders' interest or NAV up 6.3% at ZAR 73.5 billion. I was accused of stealing Estienne's time last time, so I'm gonna try and stick to the program.
Just briefly then, having a look at the international investments. GOZ, not quite sure what to say about GOZ. It really is performing and continues to perform, you know, exceptionally well. It's like the, I don't know where the phrase really comes from, the gift that keeps on giving. We got 62% of it. The cost of the investment's ZAR 9.6 billion. The market cap, so market value is about ZAR 24.2 billion. The dividend grew at 4%. It remains very much core to Growthpoint core investment, especially considering our experience and knowledge in that market, having been there since 2009. GOZ's balance sheet is in great shape. LTV's below 30%. They've got great access to liquidity.
They refinanced quite a bit of their debt during the period. In fact, in attracting new loan facilities, they attracted the lowest pricing, all-in cost of debt on that new ZAR 150 million facility, in its history since literally 2009. Its debt expiries, the nearest one is December, but it's not a significant amount. NAV per share grew healthily at 9%. 58% of all the debt exposure there is fixed for a period of 4.1 years at an average rate of 3%. At the portfolio level, property portfolio value grew at 11%. It's a combination of acquisitions and revaluation. Like for like revaluations were up by 6.6%, adding over ZAR 300 million to the asset portfolio.
97% of the portfolio is leased to government, listed companies and large organizations. Portfolio's 97% let. It's got a 5% weighted average cap rate in terms of valuations. 6.3-year weighted average lease length. 106,000 sq m of space was let during the period. There were three acquisitions amounting to about ZAR 261 million during the period. As I mentioned a bit earlier, they invested another $60 million, maintaining our 15% shareholding in the Dexus Industria REIT. Globalworth, on the other hand, we have a 29.4% interest in that particular company. The cost of our investment's ZAR 8.4 billion. The market value ZAR 7 billion. Share price clearly not really reflective. It's not an actively traded share.
Four shareholders own 95% of the shares, so there's zero liquidity in the share. We would much rather refer to underlying net asset value as a marker rather than share price. Nonetheless, that's the number. The dividend didn't decrease from ZAR 0.15 to ZAR 0.13. The operational bottom line, FFO and distributable profit performance still impacted by the high cash balances. There's still over EUR 400 million of cash that the company has been sitting with on its balance sheet. We refer to that more broadly as a cash burn, earning zero on that cash. In fact, paying 3 odd%, 3.5 odd% interest on the one hand and paying the bank 50 odd basis points to hold your euros.
That having a negative impact on the bottom line dividend. The balance sheet remains pretty robust. There's, as I said, ZAR 418 million of cash, ZAR 215 million of undrawn facilities. Gearing net of cash is about 40%. And there's some near-term debt expiries, EUR 323 million of debt maturities in the next twelve months. On the development side, a relatively modest development activity compared to, let's say, pre-COVID times. At the moment there are 5 logistics facilities being developed in Romania, about just short of 100,000 sq m.
In Poland, the bulk of the development activity is focused around two assets, the Renoma asset and the SuperSAM asset, where these were mixed use properties, where funny enough, the retail element was really struggling and we've converted a lot of that retail into offices. The bulk of the investment activity or redevelopment activity taking place in Poland is in relation to those two assets. The company has about EUR 3.2 billion worth of assets, 37 in Poland and 29 in Romania. Some pretty decent letting took place during the period, 285,000 sq m, about 91,000 sq m in the second half. Vacancy is just over 11%. The portfolio is a very high quality portfolio with 99% of rent collections during the FY 2021 financial year.
Their financial year-end is December. At this time, there's not much impact of the conflict across the border. Obviously both Poland and Romania border the Ukraine. I spoke to the CEO of the business just yesterday, and he tells me that on the ground, things are normal. Things are business as usual. What's evident is the obviously the humanitarian side of things, where you're seeing obviously refugees, over 1 million refugees into Poland, obviously into Warsaw, and about 100,000 into Romania. A lot of them also finding their way into Bucharest. That is visible on the ground, but operationally, in terms of the portfolio, the tenants, the letting, very little impact at this time.
Who knows, you know, how things escalate and what happens over the next couple of months as this unfolds, but for now, things are pretty stable. Capital & Regional. We own 60.8% of CapReg. Cost of our investment, ZAR 3.5 billion. Market value, ZAR 1.3 billion. Capital & Regional undertook a GBP 30 million equity raise during the period late last year, which Growthpoint underwrote. We ended up investing a further GBP 24 million. As I mentioned, no dividend, but they have guided for a dividend later this year. We continue to believe in the value of that platform and the management team and the pretty narrow focus that they have on community centers and needs-based retailing. Balance sheet's looking a lot better. They.
Obviously, there was the recapitalization, the equity raise last year together with the mall facility debt restructure, as well as the reclassification of two of the assets, Hemel Hempstead, and Luton, which are held for sale or designated as managed assets. That effect has had the effect of reducing gearing from 72% to 49%. There's every prospect that the 49% could come down by another 200 odd basis points once we receive the proceeds from the sale of the residential land at Walthamstow. We sold a small office for GBP 7 million. Company's got high cash reserves of GBP 58 million. Property valuations for the assets that are shown as owned at GBP 380 million have remained stable for the last six months.
That is a massive turnaround in and of itself. I mean, since we invested there in December 2019, between December 2019 and now, we have seen 50% writedown in property values in the U.K. retail portfolio. To go through two quarters or six months with no further writedowns is, to our mind, a signal that we have bottomed out and that, hopefully from here on forward, nobody's projecting, you know, stellar returns or stellar upward revaluations, but certainly the ongoing destruction of value with valuation writedowns is hopefully at an end. On the portfolio side, pretty robust letting. 143 leases. Occupancy is at about 93%. Very strong footfall in the centers.
Over 47 million people visited those centers in the 12 months to December 2021. The residential sale of GBP 20 million is progressing well and should hopefully receive the funds in the next couple of months. I'm gonna hand over here to Estienne, and then I'll come back on the conclusion. Just checking the time on here.
Norbert. Well, yeah, what a difference two years makes. I think the last time I was here, I made reference to the view behind me, which at that stage were these very, very large dark clouds that had formed. For those that were here may remember that. I think the analogy now, based on the same logic, would be good, but the view looks a little bit bluer and more clear. Hopefully, that holds true flows through to the South African property market going forward. If we look at the business, the salient features for the six months. We've had good success in collecting our deferred rentals. And things across the board in the tenant base, in terms of collections are looking significantly better.
Vacancies are starting to come down in certainly retail and office, and that brought down the overall vacancy down to 10.5%. Lots of activity in terms of letting. We've let over 758,000 sq m of space at a 77.3% renewal rate, which has also improved. That has come at a cost, unfortunately. We are still seeing that there's significant negative reversion, specifically in the office side of things. That has improved in industrial and hopefully we'll start seeing as the market improves in the various sectors that should narrow. Arrears have remained quite sticky, but have improved marginally. We've got a couple of large arrears that we're busy working with that remain in the book.
They have been provided for and, you know, we'll just have to work through those processes in respect of liquidations and business rescues before, you know, those numbers will correct. Valuations have kind of stabilized. Just a marginal decrease in valuations. Then on the asset sales side, we've had quite some success in the six months where we've sold non-core assets to the extent of ZAR 1 billion. We've continued to invest in development. We've spent ZAR 480 million there, and our commitments in terms of future developments at ZAR 425 million. Continuing investing into the portfolio, trying to improve the offering for our clients. Then we've made a strategic acquisition in terms of our Growthpoint Investment Partners business in terms of the student accommodation fund.
Just a summary on the discounts deferments. You can see from the slide that in the six months the amount of discounts that we've had to offer significantly reduced to ZAR 12 million. We've only had to also provide additional deferments of about ZAR 5 million. Still incurring expenses on all the stuff related to COVID of ZAR 10 million. You know, that would certainly help if some of the measures that we have in terms of masks and sanitizers and all these kind of things are lifted from a cost perspective for us. The total impact was ZAR 23 odd million in the period.
If we look at the arrears and provisions, we can see that, you know, the arrears are starting to improve somewhat, and that the impact on the income statement for bad debts was only ZAR 10 million in the period. Our total provisions we've reduced marginally from ZAR 174 million-odd down to ZAR 165 million-odd. Very well provided in terms of the arrears. As I mentioned, a couple of sticky ones in there, which I'll touch on as we go through. On the retail side, the portfolio today has reduced to 43-odd properties. It's 1.3 million sq m of space. The valuation's been written down to ZAR 24.7 billion. The portfolio seems to be improving from a fundamental perspective.
We've seen vacancies reduced to 4.7%. In that 4.7%, there's quite a component of offices, which if you took those out, will leave you about 3.8% odd. There's a couple of big vacancies that we've got in one or two of our assets. One specifically in Bayside down Milnerton way, and then in two assets in River Square and The Avenues. The Avenues being on the for-sale list, and we're actually in the process of selling that asset at the moment. Renewal success rate has improved significantly, but that has come at the cost of the rental line and at the cost of the escalations that come with that.
Those fundamentals in my mind still need to improve before we can say the sector has turned you know for the better entirely. That is encouraging signs. Arrears as I mentioned you know there are a few big tenants in there. We've got Ster-Kinekor which is at ZAR 37 million and that number continues to tick up until the business rescue practitioner's transaction with the new buyer is concluded and then we'll be able to write that off. It's fully provided for. CNA is another big number in that. If we look at the total like-for-like income that as a result of all these negative renewals that reduced by 5.7%.
What was encouraging was trading density growth is back, and we can see that that's up at 7%. The smaller centers are still performing better, but we are starting to see the regional shopping centers improve their trade. We effectively seeing basket sizes have increased, albeit that the footfall hasn't returned to pre-COVID levels. When we look at the valuation side, I think it's the first half that we've had in probably three or four halves that we haven't written down properties. A marginal increase there. Then I think retailer performance remains reasonably robust and it looks like that hopefully if that continues to improve, we'll start seeing that coming through in the rental side of things. The difficult sector remains office.
You know, vacancies have increased, and some of them are very, very sticky. It's a very competitive market. It's quite oversupplied, but it's in specific nodes. If we go and look at the Cape Town and Durban markets, actually our vacancies here are significantly lower at around 16%, probably going closer to 10% towards the end of the financial year. In Durban, it's below 10% already. Significantly better than the Gauteng market. The Gauteng economy has been very, very badly affected by the economy and you know, specifically Sandton, where we've got a big exposure.
Certainly there, we're competing not only with other vacancies in the market, but even with some of our tenants which are subletting what we call ghost vacancies in the market in that specific space. Our view is that, you know, the economy will have to improve quite a bit to take up the slack. You know, I think I was quoted that I thought that would probably take 3-5 years to probably take up that slack in the market. Renewal success rate is 55-odd%, so marginally better. It is a very competitive market out there, and that's putting fundamental pressure on the growth rate on renewals as well as the escalations on renewals.
Arrears have shown a steady decline, and certainly, you know, the amount of deferrals that we've had to provide in that space is significantly less. Like-for-like growth reflects what's happening in the renewal space, and in that the like-for-like growth is negative at 9.8%. What we are seeing is that the work from home sort of trend, you know, certainly when we speak to management teams of many of our clients, they don't believe it's sustainable and that many staff, you know, are looking to come back to the office and work but have some flexibility.
I think the way that we're thinking about the office space is that, you know, tenants are focused more on the quality of the building, the quality of the environment that they are working in, the sustainability of that offering, and that they have flexibility and those facilities must basically accommodate those flexible working environment. Valuations, albeit negative, certainly the rate at which they've been written down has reduced significantly. On the industrial side, here things have certainly perked up quite a bit. We've seen vacancies come down from 9.4% to 6.5%. In the Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal, those vacancies are below 1% now. If we take out certain structural vacancies in Gauteng, that vacancy should be around about 6.5%.
Renewal success rate has also kicked up significantly, and the only sort of real negative factor there that still needs to come into line is the actual renewal growth rates. The escalations, enforced escalations, I did have a look at this number where on renewal it reflects 6.4%, but it's obviously only for a six-month period, and there was really one very large lease that had quite a negative impact on that. I do see that renewal number probably being a little bit higher by year-end. Arrears, you know, we still have a couple of large tenants that are in trouble that we're trying to work through. These things do take a little bit of time, but the trend there is also positive.
Like-for-like growth is positive at 4.5%. You know, in this market, certainly the industrial team have taken the opportunity to use the strong demand to be able to sell properties into the space. Valuations are still reflecting though the decline in the rental line. When we look at our ESG initiatives, we've been quite busy. We've spent ZAR 3.4 million on solar investment. You know, that investment is set to continue in that we with the restrictions being lifted from one meg to 100 meg, you know, certainly on our properties it gives us a bit more scope to be able to roll out some of the solar initiatives a little bit more aggressively and we will be spending a little bit of money in that space.
We've got 99 green buildings today. We've got a level one BEE rating. We have undertaken a survey among our staff in respect of ethics, and we'll be developing an ethics strategy which the board will approve within this financial year. We also have six focus areas in respect of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. You know, many of these initiatives are really market leaders and certainly I can highlight Property Point and our Growth Markets initiative as two of those which really we've been able to even find some of our competitors and partners in the property industry now participating in those initiatives in terms of the good that they are doing. On the waterfront here, it's very nice. You can see things are looking much more rosy and bright. We've managed...
The team here have managed to reconfigure the Edgars space. Zara is in and trading and looking very, very nice. The construction, if you look out the window, you might even just be able to see the construction happening here on the new Investec Bank offices. That will be complete in the next two years. The net property income, as Norbert mentioned earlier, has kicked up significantly with 62%. We've seen a large reduction in the COVID relief that we've been having to pass through to our tenants. Really, we're looking at the tenants that are very exposed to tourism, and I think that probably is towards the end now, given what we are seeing in the hotels and around if you walk.
I think, hopefully, we'll see the end of these relief measures. Then we've been very blessed to finally win our rates appeal with the city and the municipal rates bill has come down significantly. As a result, we've been able to refund very aptly in December when many of the tenants needed it with that new Omicron announcement. We refunded tenants over ZAR 77.5 million in rates payments. The contribution to our income statement at the V&A is ZAR 28.5 million. Arrears on balance is about ZAR 172 million, and we've got ZAR 65.9 million of doubtful debt provisions there. Our collections are at 93%, and that's in the current period, it's moved up to 98%.
The visitor numbers have increased, but are still down on pre-COVID levels. I do see that also improving as we move on. Retail has recovered. Certainly the strong sales in the luxury goods sector is evident of that. Then vacancy levels remain very low. There's strong demand from tenants for additional space in the V&A, and it's really just, as I mentioned, the tourist-dependent tenants that we are still offering relief there. On the office side, the V&A's always had a very quality tenant base with more than 65% of the tenants here being Blue Chip, and the demand is strong and the vacancy is at 2.7% remains very low.
The hotel side, it's been pretty heavy lifting for the past two years. Certainly, feedback from the past week that I've been speaking to some of the hotel managers directly here, they've indicated the hotels are significantly fuller and, you know, certainly if you're trying to get into the Rad today, you can't get into the Radisson RED, which is a very good thing as a sort of a sign of things improving. Then there was a significant oversupply in the residential stock in this catchment area, but the vacancy there was at 30% for December, but that's also improved to 20-odd%.
Then the tenants in the fishing industry continue to trade normally and the cruise terminal has opened, but you know, demand is slowly coming back. Travel, there's still a lot of friction with travel coming to South Africa in terms of having to have tests, the requirements for tests, requirements for masks, the uncertainty. I think as that improves, hopefully, you know, we'll see a marked improvement in the cruise industry. If we look at the Growthpoint Investment Partners, you know, the new name does reflect the very essence of what differentiates us from other asset managers, where we co-invest with our investors into these property investments. Our first fund was the healthcare fund. We still own 55.9% of the fund.
It consists of six hospitals and one medical chambers building. The fund has performed incredibly well through this period. I mean, the distribution, I think, last year was about 11.3%, if memory serves me right. For this six months, it's at 7.5%, which certainly, you know, is significantly uncorrelated from the rest of the commercial portfolio. Our asset management fees were at ZAR 19.4 million. We've had success in securing a transaction with the IFC, which was a combination of equity finance into the vehicle, as well as a convertible debt package, which is a road to equity for the IFC into this fund.
The fund acquired the Cintocare Hospital in August and certainly has a very good long pipeline of opportunity that will hopefully grow this fund over the next year. Lango is our African property fund that we in JV with Ninety One on. We own 16.3% into this fund at a cost of ZAR 739 million. It's valued at ZAR 852 million. The NAV, so the equity of the fund is at ZAR 327 odd million. The fund had its first interim distribution there of ZAR 6.5 million, and that translated to ZAR 16.6 million for Growthpoint. The distribution from the man co is done annually, and we expect that before the end of the year.
Today, the fund has $600-odd million worth of assets in Ghana, Nigeria and Zambia, and then two tracts of land in Angola. I think the idea would be obviously to sell those potentially if we could find a buyer for those two pieces of land. The Lango is in advanced discussions to raise additional capital, so with additional capital partners there. The fund will be looking to expand into other jurisdictions as well to diversify across the continent. The Circle Mall, which was damaged with the riots in Nigeria, will be up and running in the third quarter. On the student accommodation fund. This fund was launched in December 2001.
We own 16.8% of the fund at a cost of ZAR 240 million. It consists of seven properties, and which is 4,979 beds worth ZAR 2 billion. It's effectively a JV between ourselves and the Feenstra Group. This portfolio being the seed portfolio mainly owned by the Feenstra Group, which was injected into the fund where we raised in aggregate ZAR 1.5 billion, if we include the ZAR 160 million from Feenstra and the ZAR 240 million from Growthpoint. The ultimate idea here is to grow this fund and expand it to ZAR 12 billion, and potentially, if the market will be conducive in seven odd years, list the portfolio.
On the capital management side, a lot of work has been done by our treasury team here. The total nominal debt for Growthpoint on a consolidated basis is ZAR 38.7 billion. This is the South African debt specifically consolidated with all the funds that we have, excluding Lango. In that process, I've already mentioned the ZAR 60 million convertible loan that we secured from the IFC. We further raised another ZAR 550 million bridging loan from Investec for the student accommodation fund. The weighted average term of the debt has shortened marginally to 2.7 years, and the unsecured component of that is 54.3%. Moody's rating is currently Ba2, and our national scale rating is Aa1.
The ZAR 2.4 billion of debt maturing in the next twelve months has ZAR 1.1 billion of that being bond finance. The company obviously continually, on a monthly basis, we have a treasury committee. We review all the debt, the maturities of this debt profile, and we strategize exactly as to, you know, which action will be most appropriate for which debt tranche given the market. Clearly, in the current environment, things are a little bit tight in the local and international debt markets given the uncertainty. We are looking at various strategies to address that. On the liquidity side, the company is very, very well positioned. We've got over ZAR 6.2 billion of available facilities and ZAR 500 million of cash. To ensure that, you know, any...
We're ready for any eventuality, 'cause, you know, every presentation, a week later, something happens. We're getting a bit neurotic about these things, right? We're making sure we're well covered there. On the interest rate side, we've hedged our debt to the extent of 81.4%, and that is at a weighted average cost of 7.6%. Our foreign investments are funded through CCIRS for GOZ. Capital & Regional has no foreign debt to it or CCIRS. The Globalworth and Lango is funded with the US dollar bond and CCIRS. That is then your turn. Thanks, Est. At this rate, we might even finish a little bit early, which will be a first.
Just in conclusion, trying to draw a bit of conclusion, looking at the different aspects of the business. I think South Africa remains a bit of a problem child. Things are still tough. The economy is, you know, not quite back at pre-COVID levels. You know, perhaps even by the end of 2022, it's still unlikely to be ahead of pre-COVID levels. You know, that will pose ongoing challenges, I guess, you know, for the business. We have seen obviously a bit of an improvement in the retail and industrial side, and that's obviously, you know, very encouraging. Office likely to remain challenging for a while still to come. The balance sheet is in great shape.
I mean, with the LTV levels at just below 40, and the level of liquidity that Estienne highlighted there earlier, we've got ample liquidity. We remain focused on streamlining the South African portfolio and growing the business of Growthpoint Investment Partners. The V&A Waterfront has staged a remarkable turnaround. We're pretty confident actually that through to the end of the year, again, obviously barring any COVID curveballs, but I mean, from what's evident at the moment, looks like, you know, the international tourists have returned with a vengeance. We think that that's been the only component, I guess, of the waterfront, you know, that hasn't really returned to pre-COVID levels.
I mean, the actual retail trade, David was saying in February and March, we're back at literally pre-COVID levels in the retail trade. Restaurants, not 100% there yet.
The hotel sector is still lagging. As the international tourists start coming through, the odd cruise liner does appear every now and again. It's mainly domestic cruise. International cruise is not there yet. Cape Town Airport is certainly a lot busier in terms of international travel with about 40%. I think, David, you said earlier that it's up to 60% of pre-COVID sort of capacity, international flights coming in. We're confident that that's gonna sort of flow through and then continue through to the end of the year. We continue to look for improved contribution from the Waterfront. Clearly, it's gonna take a bit of a stretch to get back to pre-COVID levels of distributable income. I think it was ZAR 1.2 billion-ZAR 1.3 billion in total.
We certainly are targeting to get well above ZAR 1 billion or above ZAR 1 billion again, and hopefully, you know, through to the end of the year and into next year, we'll get back to pre-COVID numbers. Growthpoint, almost really not much to say really about Growthpoint. It really is performing extremely well. I think one of its challenges is actually finding growth opportunities. The market is exceptionally competitive. Buying new properties or investing in new properties is extremely expensive. You know, even on the fund management side, we have aspirations to grow funds management business within Growthpoint. Those opportunities are few and far between, and as I said, very, very competitive.
I mean, the SARS share price, I think, is a shade under $4.40, trading close to NTA and a shade under all-time record high. Hopefully that can continue. Globalworth, relatively unaffected by the pandemic. I mean, vacancies did tick up a little bit. In the last sort of quarter, vacancies did come down, but overall for the year, vacancies did tick up a bit. The tenant base is obviously a very international tenant base, multinational companies. The company does have large cash holdings on balance sheet, and but also has a bond that needs to be refinanced or repaid in June 2022. We continue to look for, you know, options to maximize the value from that investment.
It's fair to say that it's probably suboptimal for us to sit with a 30% shareholding and new controlling shareholders between Aroundtown and CPI owning just over 60%. We used to be the largest shareholder and the shareholder of reference. We're now a true minority, and you know, it's not an ideal position for us. It's not our investment style. We continue to look for opportunities to maximize value from that investment. As I said, the share price is a technical listing. There's no real trade, and there's no actual purpose is being served by having that entity listed. Capital & Regional valuations have bottomed out. Income seems to be you know pretty robust, and letting seems to be pretty you know pretty good.
We're quite confident that C&R and the U.K. retail space has bottomed out. We're seeing increased investment activity now back into the sector. We certainly, you know, still subscribe and remain confident in the strategy of investing into community centers. I guess that brings us to the conclusion or the guidance. Now, this is not much of a guidance, as you'll see. We're still not confident, I guess, in giving guidance like we used to do in, you know, two years ago or in the past. We will definitely continue to pay a dividend at least 75% of distributable income.
We have got the, you know, the sort of the liquidity and the balance sheet strength and the cash flows to obviously to maintain this dividend strategy. Where's Kundai? We sort of posing the question on whether this is the start of the next bull run in listed property in South Africa and have we bottomed out? I'll put that out there with a little bit of a smile, but Kundai and I were speculating last night. Look, I mean, certainly we feel, you know, a lot more optimistic, you know. When things are open and operating and restaurants are open and flying is okay and getting together like this is fine and companies are going back to the office in a meaningful way.
I mean, all of you that are here, I'm not sure what you're experiencing in your own offices, but I mean, there's definitely, you know, I think a need. People who need and want to get back into the office. Yes, there'll be flexibility, and not everybody's gonna rush back day one, and not everybody's probably gonna rush back from six till seven. Well, look, that doesn't really happen in Cape Town anyway, but maybe from nine till 4:30, five days a week. I think that we definitely feeling, you know, a lot more positive and we hope that, you know, that this can continue. We look forward to being here again in six months' time, hopefully sharing a bit more positive news with you.
We have got a very big component of our team here, a lot of our asset managers, you know, retail, office, industrial, are all represented here. Cape Town office represented here. Treasury, Dirk is here. Obviously the finance team as well, and also the Waterfront team. Please feel free to stick around, guys. Have something to eat and drink. Feel free to ask some of the more detailed questions, perhaps, of those individuals. We're gonna go to questions. Yeah, I forgot questions. We're gonna go to questions, and there... Diana's got the microphone there. I don't know if there are questions from coming from the live web feed.
These are questions received online, and then Max will do a quick roundabout with any questions from the floor. You've stated a strategy to further internationalize. However, this strategy is not being rewarded by the South African markets, but rather penalized. As an example, GOZ's trades on a 4.5 yield in Australia, yet its cash flows are valued an implied 10 yield within Growthpoint. I calculated today, for instance, there is ZAR 16 billion holding company discount in Growthpoint. At what point do you think you'll relook at this strategy, given the increasing opportunity cost?
I guess this talks to GOZ and the discount, you know, the implied discount. The, I mean, we're trading at a share price of whatever it is, ZAR 13.50. NAV is ZAR 21.45. It's a massive discount, 40-odd%, different ways of calculating that. But the question is, at what point will you re-review the strategy? It's obviously quite topical. We saw PSG unbundle just recently, unlocking the discount that they were trading at as a holdco. I think Growthpoint, there is perhaps, you know, there is some merit in looking at Growthpoint as some sort of a holdco or of an investment trust. You know, those things always trade at a discount. Maybe not as simple as a PSG.
All their subsidiaries are all directly listed here in South Africa, so it's very easy to just unbundle those to your shareholders. Our investments are not all listed yet. CNA is, Globalworth isn't, and CapReg and GOZ isn't. You can't just unbundle them and give them to your South African shareholders. They need exchange control approval and foreign exchange approvals to hold those shares. Some of the institutionals can, but certainly individuals can't without getting that approval. One can inward list, obviously, GOZ and then unbundle, as unbundling makes sense when potentially you could sell it at a premium. You lose your control premium if you could sell it. Look, I think the question is at what point. The answer is we continuously look at it.
We have a board strategy at the end of the month, in two weeks' time, end of March. It will again be raised and discussed. It's an ongoing evaluation, you know, throughout the year, and certainly at the very least annually at the board sort of strategy sessions.
Okay. Another question. Do you envisage stepping up the payout ratio between 80%-90%? And if so, is there any tax leakage?
At the moment, we haven't fiddled with that 80% payout ratio. We are aware, clearly, of the fact that there's sort of a withholding on withholding almost, you know. GOZ is only paying out 78%, and now we're paying out 80%. Effectively, the GOZ payout is something like a 64-odd%. We're acutely aware of that. We again, I think as part of the ongoing strategic evaluation, looking at, you know, the strength of the balance sheet, the prospects, it is something which will come up for discussion. At this particular point in time, we are not inclined to fiddle with the 80.
You know, if things remain positive and continue to improve from where we are today, I think, you know, it is something that the board could, you know, could consider. We are also obviously very aware of the tax leakage or, you know, linked to the withholding or to the 20% withholding. We had a little internal session just a few days ago to again try and find solutions for that. We think we may be onto something, but it is not something that's gonna be ready in the next, you know, the next two or three months. You know, perhaps it takes 'cause it does involve some regulatory involvement, you know, through the JSE and possibly even through the revenue services.
There'll have to be some engagement with them to try and find a solution for this tax leakage. But it is being reviewed again also, you know, all the time.
Okay. It appears that majority of GOZ's rerating of its assets is attributable to lower cap rates. Now that the Aussie curve has moved back up to pre-COVID levels, should we expect the cap rates to follow the curve higher and the NAV to reduce?
This talks to GOZ's valuations. I mean, it's been quite incredible. I mean, they had a 6.6% like-for-like upward revaluation in the last six months, and the prior six months was similar. You know, with interest rates moving, it doesn't appear like the Aussie central bank are in a hurry to raise interest rates in Aussie, though. You know, eventually, I think if everybody, the Fed yesterday the Fed announced the 25 basis point increase, and they're talking about six further increases. ECB are tomorrow, if I'm not mistaken. Sorry, not yeah. Not the ECB, the Bank of England. Globally, interest rates are rising. Eventually, Aussie rates, I guess, would have to rise. It might not be in the next six months or the next twelve months, but eventually, yes.
That will definitely have an impact on property values, yeah. Yeah. I think Ashton just points out that, you know, one of the, you know, what the factors we are seeing at the moment, certainly in the industrial sector, is real rental growth, you know, has returned in the Aussie industrial sector in particular. Office is not so much. The Aussie market is a little bit confusing with this incentive story. You know, face rents and net effective rents and so you don't really see the rents moving, you just see the incentives reducing. They're not 40% anymore, they go to 30% or 25%. It's a bit of a confusing market that way.
Yeah, that will have a sort of countervailing impact. As rentals start rising, you know, that'll be positive, negating I guess some of the cap rate expansion.
Are there any preferred options for the 2023 Eurobond maturity when Growthpoint likely to settle or refinance the Eurobond?
I'm gonna just repeat it, the 323?
Are there any options?
Is that the Growthpoint bond or the Globalworth?
The Growthpoint one.
Growthpoint 1.
Growthpoint.
Yeah. Look, again, we haven't made any final decisions yet on refinancing that bond and exactly how to, you know, go about that. You will notice that we're sitting with an extreme liquidity position of over ZAR 6 billion. The thinking there is we need to cover obviously any debt that expires domestically. The number there that was quoted was ZAR 2.4 billion. You know, even if we aren't able to refinance any of that in the bond market, we've got the facilities in place to draw down and repay, you know, that debt. Half of that roughly was in the bond market. You know, also linked to the international bond.
You know, should we at the end of the day decide not to refinance it could be you know we have got liquidity to cover that in the facilities that we have.
Are you expecting Globalworth to reduce its cash holdings given the reduced risks surrounding COVID-19?
I suspect. Can't talk for Globalworth really, at the end of the day in terms of the final decision, but they've got that EUR 400-odd million of cash on balance sheet. They've got EUR 350 million bond to be repaid in June 2022. Instinct to my mind would say to use the cash to settle the bond, because the bond market's looking, certainly right now in the last couple of weeks since the war in Ukraine started, the bond markets are, you know, not that liquid or not that supportive. I suspect that, you know, they might use some of the cash to settle the bond. But that's not. There's no formal decision on that.
Okay, last question from the line. If retail and office reversions are negative in mid- to high-teens%, how are your valuations as far as I can tell from a like-for-like basis on property values, basically flat?
Yeah. I guess the question there is, you know, like for like rental reversions. Rental reversions are still negative 6% -- like a 15%. Like for like, net property income growth is negative in office and retail. You know, how come valuations have sort of, let's say, not kept track, you know, with a downward trajectory. I do think. You know, my personal view is I think that, you know, the valuation write-downs that we saw, we've taken over 16%, I think, valuation write-down since the onset of COVID. My personal view is that the valuers were probably a bit extreme in their assumptions early on, and that, you know, effectively, their guess right now, there's still continuing weakness in rental growth or lack thereof.
Some of that was already baked in in terms of the conservative valuations that were performed through the COVID period. I think somebody asked me earlier, you know, do I personally think that we are more or less at the bottom or at the end of the, let's call it downward revaluation cycle? I would say that our feeling is that we are. Clearly if, you know, if we continue to see ongoing negative property fundamentals, ongoing negative reversions, ongoing increases in vacancies, that kind of stuff, then, you know, perhaps, you know, there would have to be a further write-down in the next six to 12 to 18 months.
It's very data dependent on what's actually happening then with the, you know, underlying net income growth or lack thereof in the portfolio.
Again, on office, have you been able to measure the level of gray vacancy in the office portfolio, specifically within Sandton?
Question is whether we measure the gray vacancy or ghost vacancy, whatever they referred to. This is sort of sublet space, if you want. Whether we measure them.
Yeah.
Whether we have a feeling for that.
Yeah.
Estienne and Paul are both nodding.
Yeah.
Have we got a sense of the quantum?
Just want to check, ZAR 200,000, hey?
Especially in Sandton.
We got about 200,000 sq m of space available from sublet.
From sublet. That's not just in our portfolio.
No.
That is in Sandton across all the
Yeah, that's Sandton.
All the owners.
The existing vacancy is around 400,000 plus the 200, so it's 600.
Yeah. Okay.
that's of a total market of, if I speak in the correct, about 1.7, hey? Yeah. 1.7 is the total market that's in-
Size of the market.
Yeah.
Okay.
If we were to exit Globalworth, what would you envisage using the proceeds for? Would you consider share buybacks?
Look, I mean, we've obviously got the debt. We've got the Eurobond or the US bond, which is still outstanding. So, one would have to consider, you know, if you were to exit Globalworth, do you use the proceeds to settle the bond? That doesn't really help your internationalization story much. Can you find an alternate investment for it, I think to keep euro debt and use the proceeds to buy back your rand asset? Maybe not. Buying back shares is definitely something one should be thinking about, but bearing in mind, we just recently issued shares. So, you know, there's so many things that, you know, go round and round when one discusses these, you know, these structures and alternatives.
I think we're looking forward to a robust discussion with our board in two weeks' time to, you know, assess and discuss some of these options and alternatives. Instinctively, selling Globalworth to buy back our own shares is not, I think, one that's really something we've been thinking about too much, to be honest.
Share this level. Must be the best real estate-
Yeah.
in South Africa.
Yeah, I think Ashton points out. I mean, we haven't spoken about that much, but I mean, it does, you know, certainly the way we're feeling about how things have changed over the last 12 odd months or so, more pronounced in the last 6 odd months, that the share price is, you know, looking very cheap relative to, you know, NAV. One can try and find ways to unlock the discount. We will continue to explore ways to unlock the discount. Obviously, one way is for the share price to just rise.
We definitely think that you know at the moment you know the share is to our mind offering value and we don't often talk about you know whether the share is overvalued or undervalued. That's for you guys to decide. Certainly you know all options you know are considered and buyback would be the most logical thing to do. If your balance sheet is still sitting at close to 40% maybe not. You can't be doing it in any meaningful numbers. All right. Nothing more online.
No. If anyone has questions, I can just pass the word on now.
Anybody in the audience here has got any questions, happy to take those. Nothing? All right. Thank you very much, everybody. I think it was great seeing you here again in person. Hopefully we can do so again in a few months' time. I think we've been working on an idea that we'll do the half year presentation in person here in Cape Town and the year-end one in person in Johannesburg, and we'll see how things evolve. We used to obviously do both in Cape Town and Joburg every six months. We'll see how things evolve. We are probably more likely to just do the physical presentation in September in Johannesburg. Thanks again for your time.
You're welcome to join us and look forward to seeing you again soon. Thank you.