Newhall Land Can’t Explain Its Heavy Volume of Trading

After a week of heavy trading volume and a roller-coaster ride in the value of its units, the Newhall Land & Farming Co. issued a statement Monday that it has no explanation for these gyrations.

On Monday the Valencia-based real estate developer saw its units, which are analogous to shares of stock, close at $28.38 on the New York Stock Exchange, down $3.63 for the day, as 3.17 million units changed hands.

On Friday, Newhall’s units skyrocketed $5.75 per unit to close at $32.

In the past five trading days, Newhall’s unit price has jumped from $24.50, with an average daily trading volume of almost 1.5 million units, about 35 times its usual volume.

“All I can say is we’re not aware of any event or reason for this heavy volume of trading,” said Marlee Lauffer, a company spokeswoman.

Newhall Land is developing the master-planned community of Valencia and owns 37,000 acres in the Santa Clarita Valley.

After slumping most of this decade as the real estate market in Southern California nose dived, Newhall Land is enjoying a strong year as residential, office and corporate developments are picking up.

In its third quarter ending Sept. 30, Newhall sold a record 617 residential lots, worth $27.3 million in revenues. For all of last year, Newhall Land sold only 318 residential sites.

In the third quarter, Newhall’s net income nearly tripled to $12.5 million, compared to $4.2 million a year ago, while its revenues in the latest quarter jumped 72% to $67.3 million, from $39.2 million.