Genting remains recovery play on US, UK prospects

KUALA LUMPUR: Genting Bhd remains a recovery play on the back of relaxing restrictions in the UK and US, despite its recent earnings miss.

According to Kenanga Research, the group's 1HFY21 core loss of RM111mil missed expectations against its and street's FY21 net profit estimates of of RM507.2mil and RM345.9mil due to the prolonged lockdown impacting local earnings while a one-month movement control softened Genting Singapore's profitability.

However, the group's UK and North American units recorded a much narrower core net loss of RM516.6mil in 2Q following a 165% jump in revenue on the reopening of casino operations.

In addition, plantation earnings jumped 152% on higher crude palm oil and palm kernel prices as well as fresh fruit bunch output.

"A mixed outlook in the upcoming 3QFY21 given the prolonged lockdown in Malaysia but this should be mitigated by the improving situation in the UK and US, especially Resorts World Las Vegas.

"Overall, business volume is likely to recover from 2HFY21 due to the vaccination deployment where positive development has been witnessed in the western countries with higher vaccination rates," said Kenanga.

Post-2QFY21, the research house included Resorts World Las Vegas into its forecast and valuation, slashing FY21 earnings by 31% but raising FY22 earnings by 8%.

It also reduced FY21 net dividend per share (NDPS) by half to 7.5 sen but kept FY22 NDPS at 15 sen.

Kenanga kept its "outperform" call on Genting on the back of a pending recovery .

"With the inclusion of Resorts World Las Vegas and post 2QFY21 results revision, our new target price is raised to RM6.47 from RM6.05 based on unchanged +1SD to 5-year mean at 41% discount to SoP valuation," it said.