KUALA LUMPUR (Jan 4): UEM Sunrise Bhd, which was one of the top 10 most actively traded stocks on Bursa Malaysia on Thursday, jumped as much as eight sen or 8.08% to hit RM1.07 — its highest in about six years since February 2018.

It saw over 100 million shares traded, indicating investors' avid interest in the company due to its huge land bank in Johor, which is seen as a hotspot for the property sector due to upcoming high-value transit developments such as the Johor-Bahru Singapore Rapid Transit System and the formation of the Johor-Singapore Special Economic Zone (SEZ) in the state.

The SEZ is planned to enhance the movement of goods and people across the Johor-Singapore Causeway and to bolster the overall ecosystem of Iskandar Malaysia — in which one of the five flagship zones is Iskandar Puteri, of which UEM Sunrise is the master developer.

The stock later pared most of its gains for the day to close at RM1, giving it a net gain of just 1 sen or 1.01% over Wednesday's close, but up 17 sen or 20.48% over the past three trading days.

The current price level, which has already breached the 12-month consensus target price of 66 sen for the stock by 51%, according to Bloomberg data, gives the group a market capitalisation of RM5.06 billion. Its net tangible assets per share stood at RM1.34.

The group is controlled by Khazanah Nasional Bhd's UEM Group, with a 69.56% stake, while the Minister of Finance Inc's investment holding company Urusharta Jamaah Sdn Bhd owns 4.95%.

It now only has one 'buy' call from analysts who cover the stock, while six have placed it on 'sell' while two put it on 'hold'.

When contacted, Rakuten Trade Sdn Bhd equity vice-president Thong Pak Leng said UEM Sunrise's huge land bank in Johor also makes it a prime beneficiary of potential investments that could come into the state, which had attracted the most foreign direct investments in the country in 2022, a whopping RM70.6 billion — a huge jump over the RM6.8 billion recorded in 2020 and RM7 billion in 2021, according to the Malaysian Investment Development Authority.

For the nine months of FY2023 (9MFY2023), UEM Sunrise reported a net profit of RM48.39 million, down 19.45% from RM60.07 million in 9MFY2022, partly due to higher finance cost and lower share of results from joint ventures and associates. Revenue dropped to RM917.09 million from RM1.14 billion.