Still a payer of generous dividends

he global economy may be reeling, but it seems likely that Germany will emerge from the pandemicinduced recession in better shape than many other countries. That probably explains why Sirius Real Estate remains on most fund managers’ stockpick lists despite the randhedge counter looking rather pricey at first glance.

The German business park owner was trading at a dividend yield of below 5% earlier this month versus the 15% average of the Sa-listed property index (Sapy).

The stock, which is the JSE’S only exclusively German property company, was the bestperforming real estate counter last year, with a total return of 52%. While most other property shares have been badly beaten down since the beginning of this year, despite an unexpected rebound in early

TJune, Sirius’s share price continued its steady climb until late February, when it touched a record high of R18.36.

The stock temporarily slumped to a two-year low of about R9 three weeks later, just as the coronavirus pandemic hit the world, but has since clawed back most of its March losses. So over 12 months, Sirius is still up a respectable 40%, significantly ahead of the Sapy’s drop of about 43% over the same time.

Sirius also continues to pay a rather generous dividend — earlier this month, the company declared dividend growth of a healthy 6.3% for the year to March. That bucks the general trend as most property companies have in recent weeks either skipped or postponed dividends to help shore up stretched balance sheets.

Stanlib senior property fund manager Nesi Chetty says Sirius