Tag: Project Lane

Banks Have Put €2,000M In RE Assets Up For Sale In 2017

6 February 2017 – Idealista

Real estate assets are still treated like a hot potato in the banking sector. In order to reduce the default rate (which still exceeds 25% in the case of loans to property developers) and avoid more provisions, entities such as Bankia, BBVA and Liberbank are continuing in their efforts to accelerate the sale of portfolios of unpaid secured loans, as well as packages of real estate assets. 2017 has started with almost €2,000 million in properties up for auction. (…). They include homes, premises, offices, industrial warehouses and land.

Most of the operations have been on the market for several months, since no buyers have yet been found. Some are well known, such as BBVA’s Project Vermont, a portfolio of loans to property developers secured primarily by newly built homes and worth almost €100 million. Several funds were interested in acquired this lot: Oak Hill, Fortress and AnaCap.

And it is BBVA that has the most packages on the market, including: Project Buffalo, which contains homes worth €400 million; and Project Boston, which comprises 16 office buildings located in Madrid, Barcelona and Valencia, worth €200 million. (…).

Liberbank has put Project Fox on the market. It is a portfolio of real estate debt worth around €200 million and is the entity’s first (but not its last) portfolio of unpaid mortgages.

Other operations have also made their debuts in 2017. Such is the case of Project Tour, a package being sold by Bankia, one of the most active players in the sale of real estate portfolios. It comprises 1,800 properties (…) and is worth €166 million.

Funds start to divest their purchases

The market has also started to see how some of the international funds that have invested in our country in recent years are starting to sell some of the assets they have purchased. Last year, Lone Star made its debut as a vendor (…) when it put Project McLaren on the market. It comprises two portfolios: one containing more than 1,000 mortgage loans worth €102 million and secured primarily by homes, although there are also some commercial assets in the mix. The other portfolio, comprising more than 600 homes, has a combined appraisal value of €51 million. The firm Cabot, which specialises in managing bank loans, has expressed its interest in that portfolio.

Another fund that wants to divest some of its real estate investments in Spain is the US firm Ares Management, which has put Project Firefox onto the market: real estate debt worth around €160 million.

Bankia, Caixabank and Sareb were the most active at divesting real estate in 2016 (…).

Sareb has been one of the key players in the market (in recent times), having managed to place €1,565 million of real estate debt of all kinds with international investment funds (during its three year life). Its largest non-performing loan portfolio (Project Eloise) had a nominal value of €553.3 million and it was purchased by Goldman Sachs. (…).

In 2016, Bankia had several portfolios up for sale, including Project Ocean, Project Tizona and Project Lane.

Caixabank become one of the most proactive entities in the sale of Spanish property last year. Its most high profile sales included Project Sun, with hotel debt worth around €1,000 million; Project Carlit, with around €750 million of real estate debt; and Project More 2, containing €200 million of owned properties (REOs). (…).

Other players with more limited activity included Abanca (formerly Novagalicia) and Cajamar.

Original story: Idealista (by P. Martínez-Almeida)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Project Tour: Bankia Puts €166M Property Portfolio Up For Sale

3 February 2017 – Idealista

The banking sector is starting 2017 with a bang as it accelerates the sale of properties. Bankia has put a new real estate portfolio on the market – it does not contain debt, but rather comprises 1,800 properties, including finished homes, plots of land, retail premises, industrial assets and hotels. Known as Project Tour, the package is valued at €166 million.

Bankia is one of the most active banks at divesting real estate assets once again, as it seeks to focus on its pure banking business. It is a technique that has worked well for the banks in recent years and not just in Spain, but in other countries around the world as well.

In this case, so-called Project Tour is in the hands of the firm Alantra (formerly N+1) which intends to place this property portfolio (known by its initials in English as an REO) with international investors. Its value amounts to €165.9 million, according to financial sources consulted by Idealista.

The portfolio comprises 1,292 finished homes (it does not include any subsidised housing), 324 plots of land, 159 retail premises, 20 industrial assets and 9 hotels. None of the assets in the portfolio are rented or co-owned.

The properties are primarily located in the Community of Valencia, mainly in Valencia; Cataluña, mainly in Barcelona; the Canary Islands, mainly in Las Palmas; Madrid and Castilla y León (Segovia is home to most of these assets).

According to sources consulted by Idealista, Bankia expects to receive non-binding offers from a small number of investors by the beginning of February and binding offers by the middle or end of March. In this way, it plans to close the sale of the package during the month of March.

The entity chaired by José Ignacio Goirigolzarri (pictured above) is known as one of the most dynamic in the market: in 2016, it put several portfolios up for sale, including Project Ocean, a real estate loan portfolio worth almost €400 million, which was sold to Deutsche Bank; Project Tizona, a mortgage debt portfolio worth €1,000 million; and Project Lane, containing properties worth €288 million.

Original story: Idealista (by P. Martínez-Almedia)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Bain Capital Raises €2,770M & Sets Its Sights On Spain

8 August 2016 – Expansión

Bain Capital wants to become one of the largest buyers of real estate in Spain. On Thursday, the US fund announced that it has completed the acquisition of three asset portfolios from Spanish banks, worth €1,146 million, over the last few months. The sellers are Cajamar, Sabadell and Bankia in three separate deals.

The acquisitions have been made through the fund’s Bain Capital Credit business unit, known until now as Sankaty.

And as if that weren’t enough, in the last few days, the US investor has completed the creation of a new fund in the USA worth $3,100 million (€2,769 million) for distressed investments (assets close to bankruptcy) and assets in special situations, according to Bloomberg.

“We see potential for making new investments in the Iberian Peninsula, especially in the real estate and overdue loan markets”, said Fabio Longo, CEO and Head of the real estate and overdue loan business in Europe at Bain Capital Credit. “We are excited about the opportunity to consolidate our position in the market for non-performing real estate assets in Spain through these investments”, added Alon Avner, CEO and Head of Bain Capital Credit’s European business.

Individual transactions

Of the three portfolios purchased, the largest was bought from Cajamar, containing €511 million of overdue syndicated and bilateral loans, granted primarily to real estate developers in different phases of bankruptcy. This deal, known as Project Baracoa, was the first major competitive sale of loans by a Spanish entity.

In addition, Bain Capital Credit acquired a portfolio of loans with a nominal value of €415 million from Sabadell, comprising overdue loans to property developers, mainly secured by residential and tertiary assets. This operation was known in the market as Project Pirene.

The most recent purchase by the US fund in Spain involved the Project Lane portfolio, comprising €220 million of foreclosed assets sold by Bankia. This was the first operation of its kind carried out by the nationalised group after the failed sale of Project Big Bang at the end of last year, through which it had wanted to sell all of the homes, developments and land on its balance sheet. In the end, Bankia was unable to reach an agreement with the investor who had expressed the most interest, Cerberus.

For all of these operations, Bain Capital has been advised by the asset managers Copernicus, HipoGes and Altamira; the consultancy firms Aura REE and CBRE; and the lawyers J&A Garrigues and Cuatrecasas.

Original story: Expansión (by J. Zuloaga)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Banks Sell €11,000M NPLs To Clean Up Their B/Ss

30 June 2016 – El Confidencial

Property is still the main obstacle facing Spain’s banks. Although the majority of the domestic financial entities will comfortably pass the European Central Bank (ECB)’s upcoming stress test, most are still weighed down by non-performing loans linked to the real estate sector, which are blackening their balance sheets. To this end, CaixaBank, Bankia, Sabadell, Popular and even Deutsche Bank have put portfolios of non-performing loans up for sale amounting to almost €11,000 million, according to data compiled by El Confidencial.

The most active bank is Sabadell, which has engaged KPMG, PwC and N+1 to help get rid of €3,100 million in consumer loans, credit cards and loans granted to property developers. Of that amount, €1,000 million was sold to the funds Lindorff and Grove Capital last month in an operation known as Corus. Now, the entity has another €1,700 million on the market (Project Normandy), containing foreclosed loans from real estate developers and almost €500 million (Pirenee) corresponding to a mixture of assets. The entity is looking to close both transactions before the summer holidays.

After Sabadell, the most active bank in cleaning up its balance sheet is CaixaBank, which has two processes underway and one in the bag. These include the so-called “Project Carlit”, launched in April with the help of PwC to sell off €750 million in loans linked to shopping centres, offices and the industrial sector; and “Project Sun”, a portfolio of loans granted to almost 150 hotels that the entity foreclosed from businessmen in the sector. In total, around €1,000 million in non-performing loans.

The latter is backed by 11,000 tourist rooms, and several opportunistic funds may be interested, including Starwood, Davidson Kempner Capital and Bank of America. Those entities previously acquired similar liabilities from Bankia in 2014 and 2015 for €1,200 million. In Septemeber, the Catalan entity is planning to launch “Project More 2” containing €200 million of real estate loans, again with the help of PwC.

Bankia, which last year failed to find a buyer for its huge real estate portfolio containing €4,800 million of assets has engaged KPMG, Deloitte and PwC to advise it in 3 of its operations: “Project Lane” (€288 million), “Project Oceana” (€396 million) and “Project Tizona” (€1,000 million). The latter comprises residential mortgages and is the second part of the transaction known as “Project Wind”, when the entity sold €1,300 million in similar liabilities to the fund Oaktree.

Alongside these three major players, several other entities also have operations on the market, including Popular, Banca Mare Nostrum, Abanca (which just sold €1,300 million in NPLs to EOS) and Ibercaja…But the entity that has drawn the most attention is Deutsche Bank, because it had not chosen to clean up its accounts in this way until now. The German group, the only foreign bank with a presence in Spain, which has an extensive network of offices, is sounding out institutional investors regarding the sale of €800 million in non-performing mortgages.

Although the German entity was not greatly impacted by the real estate crash, thanks to its prudent strategy vis-à-vis granting property-related loans, the truth is that it was weighed down by packages of unpaid loans from high income clients. Antonio Rodríguez-Pina, Chairman of the bank’s Spanish subsidiary, has decided to get rid of these NPLs in order to improve its balance sheet and reduce the default ratio, a measure that coincides with Deutsche Bank’s decision to continue its operations in Spain, for the time being. (…).

Original story: El Confidencial (by Agustín Marco)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Project Lane: Bankia Negotiates Sale Of €400M Secured Portfolio

13 June 2016 – Expansión

Project Big Bang paralysed the Spanish financial sector in 2015. At the time, Bankia tried to sell all of its foreclosed assets in a single transaction, including: 38,500 homes, 2,600 plots of land and 5,000 commercial premises, worth €4,800 million. A large number of funds were interested in the sale, but only Cerberus and Oaktree expressed their intention to submit binding offers. The prices and conditions did not match with Bankia’s expections and so it decided to suspend the operation at the end of the year. (…).

With all of those roadblocks, Bankia decided that it would maximise the value of its foreclosed assets by keeping them on the balance sheet and selling them off through the retail channel and in smaller portfolios, such as the case of Project Lane, see below. Even so, sources in the sector expect to see fresh attempts to sell large portfolios of foreclosed assets over the next few months and years, something that more than one entity has planned for 2016. To this end, the markets must improve further and provisions should be adjusted even more to the prices being offered by the funds. The Bank of Spain’s new accounting circular, which comes into force in October, is expected to help in this sense and to accelerate the divestment of the banks’ problem assets.

Project Lane

Now, Bankia is negotiating the sale of a portfolio of homes with three international funds, in an operation known as Project Lane. The entity is being advised by KPMG and is looking to transfer around 2,500 homes worth c. €400 million, according to financial sources.

The operation is in a very advanced phase, with binding offers due to be submitted next week. Bankia and its advisor have selected three funds, which according to the same sources, do not include Cerberus.

Initially, the US fund was the favourite buyer for the operation, on the basis that it knows the assets better than anyone else through Haya Real Estate, the former Bankia Habitat, which manages homes and real estate loans from Bankia. In fact, Cerberus was the fund that was closest to acquiring Big Bang, with an offer of around €2,100 million.

The portfolio of assets on sale as part of Project Lane primarily comprises homes, but also includes industrial and commercial assets, to a lesser extent. It is the largest sale of foreclosed assets that any of the banks have put on the market so far in 2016. Only Cajamar has explored this option in recent months, with Project Omeya – around €72 million -, as it waits to see what will happen during the second half of the year. The 2,500 homes on sale represent around 6% of the total haul that Bankia has on its balance sheet. The entity sold 9,200 properties through its branch network and Haya Real Estate last year. The aim is to try and repeat those figures in 2016.

Since the new management team, led by José Ignacio Goirigolzarri (pictured above), took over at Bankia, the nationalised group has been one of the most active in the sale of portfolios. Last year, it sold more than 80 batches of problem assets, which allowed it to decrease its doubtful debt balance from €20,000 million in 2013 to €12,500 million by March 2016. It has managed to do this thanks to higher provisions.

Original story: Expansión (by J. Zuloaga and S. Arancibia)

Translation: Carmel Drake