Equity One's FFO Climbs Nearly 76% in Q3

NORTH MIAMI BEACH, FL-Equity One Inc., a shopping center real estate investment trust based here, experienced a 75.8% jump in funds from operations in the quarter ended Sept. 30. Funds from operations, a standard measure of a REIT’s operating performance, increased from $13.6 million in the same quarter last year to $23.9 million in this year’s most recent quarter.

Funds from operations per diluted share dropped 5.1% from 39 cents in the third quarter of 2002 to 37 cents this third quarter. This reflected a $1.5 million gain on the extinguishment of debt that raised last year’s funds from operations per diluted share by 4 cents. Not counting the gain last year, funds from operations per diluted share in this year’s third quarter would have grown 5.1%.

Third-quarter net income was $17.2 million, or 27 cents per diluted share, compared with $10.9 million, or 32 cents per diluted share, last year’s quarter. This third quarter included 2 cents per diluted share of income from discontinued operations, and the 2002 quarter included 5 cents per diluted share of income from discontinued operations. In the third quarter, total rental revenue was up 103% to $50.8 million from $25 million in the 2002 quarter.