Gatehouse Bank targets £1b loan book, new finance head says

London-based financier Gatehouse Bank aims to build up a billion pounds worth of Shariah-compliant financing loans across UK and Continental Europe, its newly appointed real estate finance Head Natale Giostra told PropertyEU in an interview.

'We have big ambitions to grow this business in the medium term,' said Giostra, who joined Gatehouse Bank in early November as executive vice-president and head of the new real estate finance division.

He previously led CBRE's UK debt advisory team, having generated in excess of £2 bn (€1.5 bn) of financing since 2010. Giostra was also responsible for co-ordinating and supervising CBRE’s debt advisory teams across EMEA.

'After nine years in the advisory business I was looking to change direction and go back to principal financing. In my advisory role I have developed a large business network that comes very useful now in origination,' Giostra said. In all, he has more than 12 years of experience in real estate banking in the UK, US, Netherlands, Spain and Italy, having previously worked for Goldman Sachs and Citigroup.

Gatehouse Bank, a Shariah-compliant investment bank, has built a global portfolio of over $1.5 bn since its inception in 2008, spread across real estate assets, capital investment and term deposits. The bank, which is majority-owned by Kuwaiti shareholders, has 40 staff in London.

The group is looking to create a strong real estate financing origination team in the coming months, Giostra noted. 'We have much flexibility in our financing strategy as we have a pan-European focus and target a broad range of products including office, retail, industrial/logistic, hotel and residential development.’ He continued: 'Our main restriction with regards to financing is that the collateral needs to be Shariah-compliant which means for example that we cannot lend to pubs, casinos or properties leased to banks.'

In general, Gatehouse will be arranging financing in the £5/£100 mln bracket with a loan to value ratio of up to 85%. Giostra: ‘However our sweet spot is the mid-market range (£10/30 mln) as there are not so many banks active and we can be more competitive in our offering. We are looking to carve out a niche for ourselves where there is less competition from other lenders.'

The initial focus will be on core assets in the UK, he added. 'Our debut transaction will be a senior loan collateralised against a well located, well let property after which we could also look into more value-added investments with good property fundamentals. In the syndication market, we are currently mainly looking at junior positions, but our strategy will include vertical participations as well.’

Commenting on the platform’s geographic focus, Giostra said that the UK will likely represent up to 60% of the targeted financing book, with the other markets making up the remaining 40%. 'We will likely start with an investment in London’s core space but I see a lot of potential in Continental European markets such as the Benelux, Spain and Italy,' he noted. 'France and Germany are also on our list but they are more challenging given that they are very much covered by the local banks.'