Tag: NH Hoteles

Bankia Benefits From NH´s Appreciation on the Stock Market & Sells 12.5% of Capital

17/02/2014 – Expansión

Bankia carries on with the intensive divestment process, prolonged for 2014. The bank has taken advantage from the advance of the NH Hoteles on the stock market to leave the chain by selling its 12.59% holding. (…).

The NH closed yesterday with €4.94, after little way up (by 0.3%). Since the beginning of the year, the company´s assets climbed up by 15.3%. If this price taken into account, the lot sold by Bankia costs about €192 million. (…)

With the purchase, AIG obtained a 3% discount. (…) The book value of the shares acquired is estimated at around €100 million. Due to the fact that on the market the holding is worth about €192 million, the buyer can expect capital gains close to €92 million. (…).

Bankia is also a shareholder in such listed companies as Mapfre (2.99%), Realia (27.6%), Deoleo (16.5%), Iberdrola (5.0%) and Metrovacesa (19.07%). (…) Since November 2012, the bank has left 89 firms.

Bankia is in 68% controlled by the Government, with view to privatization (…).

 

Original article: Expansión (G. Martínez/ Y. Blanco)

Translation: AURA REE

NH Hoteles looks for an Asian buyer for its luxury development company.

It is a part of the adjustment plan designed by NH Hoteles to alleviate its burden of 700 million Euros in debt. For this new phase, the company does not rely on its subsidiary Sotogrande Inmobiliaria, the company through which it manages its vacation resort in Cadiz. According to different sources within the real estate market, the hotel group has placed its participated company, which was founded 50 years ago as the developing company of a great residential complex with luxury and leisure properties for wealthy people, on the market.

After letting the Chinese touristic group NHA, which acquired 20% of its capital for 234 million Euros, enter its capital, the Spanish hotel group is still in need of cash and of improving its financial structure. Furthermore after the opposition to its plan of sale of assets to the real estate fund Hospitality Properties Trust (HPT) by one of the creditors (Royal Bank of Scotland), a transaction  that would have allowed the group to obtain another 240 million Euros (a part as a loan and the other for the sale of hotels).

This unexpected event has forced the company led by Federico González, who landed at NH Hoteles as a managing director at the end of 2012, to prepare a plan to sell assets in order to gain the 250 million Euros it had agreed with HPT. For this reason, just before the summer, the company closed the sale of one of its better properties, the Grand Hotel Krasnapolsky in Amsterdam for 157 million Euros to the real estate fund managed by the insurance company AXA and is now looking for a buyer for Sotogrande.

The task is not easy, as it has already tried to get rid of its division without any success. The opportunity to value the mix of the subsidiary (real estate/hotels/golf) returns now, after several years of losses and labor adjustments, trying to take advantage of the existing international interest in entering the Spanish tourist sector, as confirmed by some of the more recent operations. In this sense, the first options would be the Asian investors.

For the past few weeks NH Hoteles is a clear example of this dynamics. Several funds (BlackRock and Taube Hodson) acquired the 4,3% of the hotel group that was in the hands of the former savings banks Novagalicia and BMN for 46 million Euros, a percentage that was followed by another 5% owned by Kutxabank for another 60 million Euros. These changes could have been bigger if Bankia had agreed to sell its 12,5% to these managing companies.

According to analysts, NH Hoteles offers a high reciprocity with the Spanish and European economic recovery, as the hotel group is present in several countries of the Old Continent. (…)

BlackRock, the greatest managing company in the world, enters NH thanks to the Spanish recovery.

The recovery of the European economy in general, and the Spanish one in particular, starts to have credit among the great international investors. Due to this Blackrock, the greatest managing company of investment funds in the world, has taken a significant acquisition of interest in NH Hoteles, joined by the fund Taube Hodson Stonex (THS), according to sources aware of the operation. Both firms are the same that acquired two participations in Sacyr Vallehermoso in June, thanks to the improvement prospects in our country. In both cases, they have carried out their investments through JB Capital, the broker from Javier Botín, son of Emilio Botín.

These participations, which have to be communicated to the National Share Market Association in the next few days, have been acquired in the last two stock market sessions. On Friday both firms, along with some smaller funds, acquired the 4,3% of the hotel chain in the hands of Novagalicia and BMN at 3,44 Euros per share, for an amount of 46 million Euros, as advanced by El Confidencial. On Monday, this continued with the acquisition of the 5% in the hands of Kutxabank at 3,85 Euros (the value rocketed on Friday thanks to the operation) for 59,32 million Euros. And it could have been much greater if Bankia had agreed to sell the 12,5% of NH to these managing companies, something which was not accepted by José Ignacio Gorigolzarri as he hopes to sell at a higher price.

BlackRock is the greatest managing company in the world based on the patrimony they manage, 3,45 billion dollars (2,6 billion Euros), while THS is a specialized boutique with a volume of 5.400 million dollars (4.401 million Euros). Its main investment bet right now is Spain, as expressed in its webpage, where it assures that ”although it is still trendy to discard Spain, right now it offers the best growth and value opportunities of the developed world.

Regarding NH, the consulted firms assure that it is a company which offers a high reciprocity with the economic recovery in Spain and Europe, as the hotel chain is present in several countries of the Old Continent. It is also a clear example of the way to leave the crisis behind: reduction of debt and sale of assets. The investors think highly of the new managers of the company lead by Rodrigo Echenique, the former “man in charge of everything” of Botin at Santander.

These two firms started their bid for Spain in June, when they joined Sacyr Vallehermoso: BlackRock acquired 3,1% of the capital and THS, 5,9%. At that time the sellers were also former savings banks, which are amid a process of sale of assets, either because they are obliged by Brussels (the nationalized ones), or because they wish to reduce their leverage (all of them).

The construction company is considered one of the companies which will benefit more from the Spanish recovery. It has its own story: it has refinanced its debt until 2015, it is possible that it will sell assets such as the real estate company Testa and Repsol- the origin of the shortfall created by Luis Del Rivero- is near 20 Euros, a level which would allow it to undo its position of 9,38% of the capital without losses and return its enormous debt to banks. (…)