French Executive Castel Acquires (Some of) the Torres de Lisboa

16 December 2018

The Castel Group, which is owned by Pierre Castel, is thought to have paid about 100 million euros for four of the eight buildings in the office centre.

The Castel group, which is owned by the French executive Pierre Castel, bought part of the office centre known as the Torres de Lisboa – located on Estrada da Luz, next to the Second Ring Road. Castel finalised the transaction in October. Expresso learned that the French businessman paid just over €100 million for the assets.

The other buildings in the complex, which were not in the deal, include buildings that are occupied by Galp Energia. One of those towers belongs to the oil company and the other, Tower A, belongs to the Spanish company Merlin, which bought it last year together with the shopping centre Monumental.

Castel bought the buildings from ECS, a management company that works with asset recoveries and restructuring. In this case, the four buildings had previously belonged to the Spanish company Chamartín, which also owned the Dolce Vita shopping centres, and which went into insolvency in 2015.

Expresso contacted ECS regarding the deal, but the company declined to comment.

More than €400 million invested

With the purchase of these four buildings, Pierre Castel has reinforced its existing portfolio of offices in Portugal. The French billionaire already owns the Justice Campus, in Parque das Nações; the headquarters of Nos, Campo Grande, and one of the Colombo Towers.

Pierre Castel is now the owner of four major office developments in the capital and has already invested about €420 million in Portugal, according to calculations by Expresso.

Castel’s first acquisition took place in 2015 when the French billionaire bought one of the Colombo Towers by way of a Singapore-based fund. The tower, called the West Tower, was the second to be completed in 2011 and is fully occupied by companies such as BNP Paribas. The 14-storey building belonged to a consortium formed by Caixa Geral de Depósitos, Iberdrola Imobiliária, Sonae Sierra and CBRE Global Investors and was sold for about €70 million.

The second investment came about a year later and was the largest that Pierre Castel has made to date in Portugal. In 2014, Castel acquired the Justice Campus in Parque das Nações, an eight-building venture belonging to the Office Park Expo fund, for a little more than €200 million.

Four months after that, Pierre Castel bought another of the city’s iconic buildings – the NOS headquarters in Campo Grande – for which he paid €50 million. The 9-floor building, which can be seen from the 2nd Ring Road, right next to the Sporting stadium, was designed by CPU Urbanistas and Architects and TT Design, has an area of ​​15,000 square meters and was completed in 2012 by the Dutch company Multi Development, the same that developed the Forum shopping centres, including Almada Forum and Montijo Forum. In 2013, the building was acquired by Blackstone when it bought Multi. It was Blackstone that sold it to Pierre Castel in what was the largest real estate deal in 2016.

Tenants to remain

In these types of real estate deals, the property changes hands while the tenants are allowed to remain, just paying rent to a different account. Good tenants mean stable income for the owners. Hence, so far, all the properties bought by Pierre Castel have had well-known tenants and long-term contracts. Castel’s main line of business is also not real estate development, focusing on the wine and spirits sector.

Original Story: Jornal Expresso – Ana Baptista

Photo: Alberto Frias

Translation: Richard Turner

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