Singapore Press Holdings (SPH) recently announced its 1st half results and its property segment now contributes to almost two-third of SPH’s “Profit Before Taxation”. This is a significant contributor to operating profits and marks the close completion of its transformation from a Media Group into a Property Holdings Group. Nevertheless, from a revenue generation perspective, the Media segment is still bigger in size than the Property segment. Traditional Media remains profitable but is still declining and we just could not see any signs of the rock bottom being formed yet. As such, traditional Media will most probably continue its decline over the next few years and remain a drag on the overall profit margin.
My thoughts are that investors would be better off investing in SPH REIT if the preference is for a pure property rental income play. In the era of Google, Facebook and other...