-->

Type something and hit enter

Pages

Singapore Investment


On
HEVEA (5095) : Insider Asia’s Stock Pick: HeveaBoard


Insider Asia’s Stock Pick: HeveaBoard

HeveaBoard Bhd

LONG suffering from depressed sales and margins, Malaysian furniture manufacturers are now enjoying a revival in fortunes, helped by a recovery in the key export markets, particularly the US and Japan, and an industry consolidation exercise that has seen the exit of smaller players.

HeveaBoard is one such company that has benefitted from the furniture industry’s revival, and offers investors an attractively priced exposure to the sector. The stock is trading at an attractive trailing 12-month P/E of 5.8 times and a low price-to-book ratio of 0.7 times. Its net gearing was 38.7% in 2013 with decreasing long-term borrowings.

The company manufactures a wide range of particleboard and particleboard-based products as well as downstream particleboard based Ready-to-Assemble furniture. Approximately 80-90% of its products are exported.

Despite the furniture industry’s cyclicality, Heveaboard has been profitable with fairly consistent earnings in recent years, except for a large dip in 2011 due to the weak US dollar then.  In 2013, net profit surged 45% y-o-y to RM22.5 million, with an ROE of 10.2%.

With a strong recovery in the housing markets in the US and Japan, prospects for the furniture industry are looking more positive. US housing starts and permits fell in Aug 2014, but upward revisions to the prior month’s data suggested the housing market continued to gradually improve. Ground-breaking declined 14.4% to a seasonally adjusted annual 956,000-unit pace, but July’s starts were revised to show a 1.12-million unit rate, the highest level since November 2007.

The recent strengthening of the US dollar against the Ringgit would also be positive for Heveaboard, since its revenue is mainly USD-denominated and will improve the company’s export-competitiveness.- The Edge


Back to Top