Foreign and local investors have backed Australian fund manager Charter Hall to raise AUD600m (€383.5m) for its industrial property fund.
Charter Hall Prime Industrial Fund’s (CPIF) three-month-long raising closed oversubscribed, with more than half of the equity coming from new investors, the manager said.
Richard Stacker, the CEO of industrial at Charter Hall Group, said: “We are proud that over 40% of equity raised has come from existing investors, and close to 60% from new investors. Stacker said new investors came from Australia, Japan, Korea, Singapore and the UK.
Some of Europe’s “most substantial and well-regarded investment groups” also participated in the capital raising, he added.
“Global investment conditions remain very favourable for the Australian commercial property market, which is competitive for high-quality long-leased investment assets.”
Stacker said global investors were keen for exposure to Australia’s industrial sector, which was benefitting from growing e-commerce activity, as well as the roll-out of record infrastructure spending.
The successful wholesale equity raise would see Charter Hall Group continue to grow the size and scale of its 116 industrial and logistics property portfolio to maintain its position as one of Australia’s leading managers and developers of industrial and logistics real estate, he said.
The fresh equity will be deployed in line with CPIF’s strategy to maximise existing land bank value, enhancing current assets and further capacity for off-market acquisitions targetting industrial and logistics facilities.
CPIF fund manager, Richard Mason, said the fund had a AUD900m development pipeline which was expected to deliver over 550,000sqm of new logistics facilities.
Mason said the fund would continue to acquire assets, such as its recent purchase of the AUD118.5m Australian Federal Police portfolio in Sydney and Melbourne.
Once the full deployment of investment capacity from this equity raise is complete, Charter Hall’s flagship industrial fund, CPIF, will lift its funds under management to AUD4bn.
In total, Charter Hall Group now owns and manages industrial and logistics assets valued at more than AUD6.1bn across the group and its funds.
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