Germany's largest pension fund investor Bayerische Versorgungskammer (BVK), acting through funds managed by Universal-Investment, has acquired a portfolio of German retail properties from Corestate Capital for €687 mln.
Corestate Capital had built up the portfolio of 90 properties, located in German cities, via various deals on behalf of its club deal programme. The sale to BVK does not end Corestate's involvement, as it has awarded a mandate to continue to provide investment and asset management services for the portfolio.
Corestate and Universal signed notarized agreements on 1 April for both the mandate and the sale of the assets, which is subject to regulatory approval.
BVK has €69 bn of overall assets under management. The pension giant was the largest direct buyer of European real estate among global institutional investors last year. BVK deployed just over €2 bn in the sector, with Norway's massive oil pension fund in second place at €1.7 bn, according to Real Capital Analytics' data featured in PropertyEU's new CapitalWatch publication.
BVK is a very active investor in retail real estate. Last month, Hines and Universal-Investment deployed €190 mln in two high street property transactions in Spain on behalf of their €1.3 bn BVK mandate. In mid-January Hines and Universal acquired five Copenhagen retail assets for €119 mln. These were the eighth and ninth deals for the mandate. BVK, acting through Universal-Investment, acquired the Liffey Valley shopping centre in west Dublin for €630 mln in December 2016.
Corestate Capital and Universal-Investment also administer another BVK umbrella fund that purchased a micro-living asset in Hamburg for €64 mln in January 2017.
Headquartered in Luxembourg and listed in Frankfurt, Corestate Capital has €16 bn of assets under management. Universal-Investment is based in Frankfurt and is the largest independent investment company in German-speaking countries with €300 bn of fund assets across a range of classes.
