Tag: exit

Aelca & Aedas Enter Final Round of Sareb’s Property Developer Venture

1 June 2018 – Eje Prime

The bad bank is gradually outlining what its property development venture in Spain is going to look like. Aelca and Aedas Homes are the final candidates in the bid to take over the land portfolio that the bad bank has put on the market in exchange for entering the share capital of one of the house builders. By contrast, Vía Célere has abandoned the competition, leaving the path clear for the other two operators.

According to sources familiar with the process, Vía Célere has decided not to submit a final proposal to Sareb. The property developer, controlled by Värde Partners (51%), together with other funds, decided against going forward to exploit the bad bank’s €1.2 billion portfolio.

The bet by the entity chaired by Jaime Echegoyen is also happening because its property developer partner is listed on the stock market, such as in the case of Aedas, or has the intention of doing so, such as Aelca. That means that the financial institution will be able to divest its shares easily in the future and make a gain. That point is likely to have been one of the reasons that led Vía Célere to back out of the deal, given that it has put the brakes on its stock market debut following the postponements announced by Testa and Azora.

Original story: Eje Prime

Translation: Carmel Drake

Israeli Fund Adar Asks for Two Seats on Neinor’s Board

15 March 2018 – Expansión

The Israeli fund Adar is claiming its space at the table of Neinor’s most senior executive body. After taking ownership of 24% of the property developer and buying almost 18% of the real estate company’s shares in just one month, Adar has requested two seats on the Board of Directors.

To this end, Adar has asked that its request be included on the agenda of the next meeting, which is scheduled for 17 April at the first call, or, if the necessary quorum is not reached, for 18 April.

Adar has proposed the appointment of Jorge Pepa and Francis Btesh as proprietary directors. In this way, the group’s Board of Directors would comprise nine members, up from the current number, seven.

The last change in Neinor’s Board of Directors took place with the departure of Dominique Cressot, a Director who represented the fund Lone Star, which sold the last remaining share package that it owned in the company last January.

In his place, the shareholders appointed Alberto Prieta, Managing Partner of the Real Estate team at BDO, as an independent director.

Adar, which first acquired shares in Neinor when the firm made its stock market debut almost a year ago, is now the real estate company’s largest shareholder, ahead of the Bank of Montreal (5.2%), Norges Bank (5.06%), Invesco (5.02%), Wellington Management Group (4.96%) and Ksac Europe (4.2%). The fund controls a package worth €296 million.

Original story: Expansión (by R. Arroyo)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Lone Star Exits Neinor after Selling its 12.5% Stake for €174M

11 January 2018 – Expansión

Following this operation, the stake owned by the US fund in the property developer, which was its largest shareholder before its stock market debut, will be reduced to a token 0.4%.

Lone Star is folding up the sails in Neinor Homes, whose share capital it is almost completely exiting less than a year after the property developer’s debut on the stock market, which took place in March last year. The US fund has undertaken an accelerated placement of 9.85 million shares in Neinor, representing 12.5% of that firm’s share capital, amongst institutional investors.

Yesterday, the property developer closed trading at €18.04 per share after a decrease of 1.1%, which means that the package put up for sale was worth €177.8 million.

Nevertheless, today, Neinor has informed the National Securities and Exchange Commission (CNMV) that the price at which the placement was closed was €173.99 million, equivalent to €17.65 per share.

After completing this operation, Lone Star’s presence in Neinor, the company that it controlled 100% prior to the property developer’s debut on the stock market, will be reduced to a token 0.4%, equivalent to 350,918 shares that it is retaining to ensure that it agrees the conditions of an incentive plan for “certain directors and key employees”.

With the sale of this latest package, Lone Star is culminating a divestment process that it began in March last year with Neinor’s stock market debut, when the American fund placed 60% of the property developer’s shares on the market, for which it received revenues of around €800 million.

A few months later, in the middle of September, Lone Star divested another 27% of Neinor, receiving proceeds on that occasion of €394.6 million and obtaining profits of €166 million as a result.

Following the accelerated placement completed yesterday and entrusted to BNP Paribas, Citigroup, Credit Suisse and JP Morgan, the resources raised by the US fund from the sale of Neinor now exceed €1.37 billion in total.

Neinor, whose origins date back to 2015, when Lone Star acquired Kutxabank’s real estate assets, debuted on the stock market with a valuation of €1.34 billion. Currently, its market capitalisation amounts to €1.425 billion, up by 6.3% from that figure.

Neinor’s main shareholders include the investment firms Wellington, with an 8.5% stake; Fidelity, with around 6.8%; and Invesco, with 5%, according to the CNMV’s registers.

Original story: Expansión (by J. Díaz)

Translation: Carmel Drake