China Merchants Port's (CMP, or the "Company") 2021 results beat our expectation. Mainly thanks to the increase in port throughput over low base in 2020, tariff improvement and the consolidation of Ningbo Daxie container terminal, the Company's revenue surged by 32.5% YoY to HK$11,850 mn in 2021, basically in line with market consensus and slightly exceeding our expectation by 5.2%. In 2021, the Company's container throughput reached 135.0 mn TEUs, up 12.0% YoY. Benefited from increase in revenue per TEU, the Company's gross profit margin increased by 3.3 ppt to 45.2%, better than our expectation. The Company's net profit to shareholders increased by 58.1% YoY to HK$8,144 mn in 2021, beating the previous profit alert and exceeding our expectation by 9.3%.
We expect CMP's throughput to grow quicker than the industry average in the long term, and port side charges are expected to benefit from blooming shipping industry. Even short-term throughput growth may face headwinds due to the pandemic in China; we expect the impact to be minimized as CMP's terminals continue operating normally. In the longer term, we expect CMP's throughput to benefit from enhanced intra-Asia trade over the RCEP agreement. In addition, given persistent congestion issues, higher requirement for supply chain safety and favorable supply and demand balance in the shipping industry, port side charges are likely to benefit.
Maintain "Accumulate" rating and revise up TP to HK$17.50. On the back of a comprehensive global network, CMP's ROE is expected to improve over internal resources integration. Our TP represents 8.0x/ 7.7x/ 7.3x 2022-2024 PER.