Scentre Group's stock plummeted 5.04% during intraday trading on Tuesday, marking a significant downturn for the Australian mall owner.
The sharp decline follows a downgrade by Macquarie from neutral to underperform, with the investment bank noting that Scentre's shares had rallied more than 10% from lows reached at the end of March. Macquarie's analysis indicates the stock now trades at a 9.3% premium to pro-forma net tangible assets of A$3.45.
According to Macquarie, when separating out the highest-quality malls, Scentre's rump portfolio faces higher risk of asset devaluations. The bank assumes 44-69 basis points of capitalization rate expansion for this portfolio, which combined with income growth of 4.0-4.5% equates to an average 4.9% decline in asset value. Macquarie concluded that Scentre's earnings momentum is already priced into the stock, prompting the downgrade.