Resorts World-Reduces stake in SCL to investment holding

Story: The Group has accepted an offer to dispose part of its 33.91%

interest in Star Cruises (SCL) to CMY Capital, a wholly-owned investment arm

of Dato' Chua Ma Yu. Resorts will sell 1.01b SCL shares (representing 14.02%

interest) to CMY Capital at HK$2.62 per share (totaling HK$2.6b or RM1.2b).

Point: This effectively reduces Resorts' interest in SCL to 19.89%, and

going forward, will not be equity accounting SCL. Instead, Resorts will

recognise SCL as an investment, thereby removing the cyclical earning

patterns of SCL. Resorts will also recognise a gain of c. RM309.7m upon

completion of the transaction (in three weeks).

Relevance: We tweaked our FY07-08F earnings upward by 6-12%, erasing SCL's

potential losses from Resorts' income statement. We also upgrade our call to

a Buy (from a Hold) with a RNAV-based price target of RM4.60. The latest

development coupled with strong hilltop operations (judging by 1Q07's strong

report card) should see the stock re-rating closer to the higher end of its

five-year (excluding SCL) PE range of 20-22x. At our price target of RM4.60

per share, the stock will be trading at 21.4x FD FY08 EPS.

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