Record highs: Visitors gather at the landmark Merlion Park on the Marina Bay waterfront. Interest in SGX-listed mid-cap stocks has jumped in recent weeks, attracting institutional inflows since the start of the year. — AFP
SINGAPORE: Shares of Singapore Technologies Engineering (ST Engineering) rose to an all-time high after the company revealed fresh five-year targets and plans to raise dividend payouts in 2025, as well as from 2026 if revenue and profits continue to rise.
The shares touched a record of S$6.91 on March 20 before closing the week at S$6.62.
At an event on March 18, ST Engineering’s chief executive Vincent Chong told investors and analysts that the company wants to be known as a yield-cum-growth stock, striking a balance between rewarding shareholders with better dividends and retaining sufficient earnings to expand the business.
He said the company is targeting revenue of S$17bil by 2029, with its defence and public security business contributing the most to that target.
Its commercial aerospace business is also expected to expand.
ST Engineering’s revenue for the financial year 2024 (FY24) came in at a record S$11.28bil.
With better scale and debt management resulting in lower interest payments, it is also aiming to grow its net profit at a faster pace than its revenue over the next five years.
Consequently, the company will propose an increase in its total dividend to 18 Sing cents per share for FY25, up from 17 cents in FY24.
It also announced a new dividend policy from FY26. As it achieves progressively higher full-year earnings, it will pay out about one-third of its year-on-year increase in net profit as incremental dividends.
The company, which had been charting a string of new record highs in recent weeks, is now among the top gainers on the Straits Times Index since the start of the year, with its share price up by more than 42% during the period.
Some analysts see more upside to the stock and have raised their target prices by as much as 30%.
Seatrium’s chief executive officer (CEO) Chris Ong has been rewarded with higher pay for leading the company to its first full-year profit in seven years.
According to its FY24 annual report published on March 21, Ong received a total pay package of S$4.24mil, an increase of 126.4% from the previous year.
The package comprised basic pay of S$929,000, performance bonus and share-based payments. For FY23, he was paid a basic salary of S$675,000 and a S$1.2mil bonus.
For the year ended Dec 31, 2024, the offshore and marine specialist posted a net profit of S$157mil, bouncing back from a net loss of S$2bil a year ago.
This came on the back of better cost savings and revenue of S$9.2bil, which rose 27% year on year, driven mainly by strong project execution and increased business activity in repairs and upgrades.
The company delivered seven projects in 2024, while also completing 231 upgrading projects.
Over 2024, Seatrium secured new orders worth S$15.2bil from new and repeat customers, the highest new-order wins in a decade.
It will be paying a 1.5 Sing cent dividend for the year. Its shares closed at S$2.16 on March 21, up by almost 3% during the week.
UOB also published its 2024 annual report after the market closed on March 21. It showed that CEO Wee Ee Cheong’s S$15.05mil pay package was 5.5% lower than the S$15.9mil he received in 2023.
Wee’s annual remuneration comprised a base salary of S$1.44mil, up from S$1.2mil in 2023, and a bonus of S$13.56mil, down from S$14.7mil in 2023. Benefits-in-kind and transport, and event-related benefits amounted to S$46,944.
UOB’s net profit in 2024 grew 6% from 2023 to hit a record S$6.04bil, driven by strong net fee income and trading and investment income.
In comparison, DBS Bank paid outgoing CEO Piyush Gupta S$17.6mil for 2024, up 57% from the year before as the bank achieved record full-year net profits of S$11.4bil.
DBS said Gupta’s higher remuneration came following a pay reduction in 2023 as a result of digital disruptions to the bank’s services.
Interest in Singapore Exchange-listed (SGX) mid-cap stocks with market capitalisations of between S$1bil and S$3bil has jumped in recent weeks, attracting some S$71mil in net institutional inflows since the start of the year, according to SGX.
Data showed that the average daily turnover for this group of stocks increased about 35% to S$67mil in March, from S$50mil in 2024.
Currently, there are 43 mid-cap stocks with a combined market value of around S$75bil on SGX.
Of these stocks, Yangzijiang Financial has seen the greatest increase in trading activity in 2025.
The financial investment firm, which has seen its shares punch through a series of record highs in recent weeks, closed on March 21 at a fresh record of 72 cents, up by almost 10% through the week.
Yangzijiang Financial has been on the move since early February, after a report by The Edge Singapore that the stock was substantially undervalued despite being profitable and paying out 40% of its 2024 earnings as dividends.
The firm’s chairman and CEO Ren Yuanlin later told the publication that its maritime investment business could see further growth as demand increases from the industry to finance ships with engines capable of using green fuels.
Supermarket operator Sheng Siong Group has had the highest return on equity (ROE) of 26.7% among the SGX mid-caps in 2025 so far. ROE indicates how well a company uses the money invested by shareholders to create value.
Sheng Siong, which announced a 6.1% increase in gross profit for 2024, has had a strong start to 2025 with the launch of two new stores in Singapore. Its shares closed flat on March 21 at S$1.64.
Shares of purpose-built accommodation operator Centurion Corp advanced to an all-time high of S$1.16 on March 19, bringing its market capitalisation to just shy of the S$1bil mark that qualifies it as a mid-cap stock.
The shares closed the week at S$1.12, up by more than 5% through the week. — The Straits Times/ANN
