Icade inks debt financing deal with Allianz

French real estate investment trust Icade has announced the signing of a 12-year mortgage financing loan with German investor Allianz Group.

The financing facility, for a total amount of €200 mln, is securitised against the Parc du Pont de Flandre business park. The bank coordinating this operation is Crédit Agricole CIB.

Icade, a subsidiary of Caisse des Depôts, said the deal is an indication of ‘the attractiveness of business parks and of the quality of Icade's credit’.

The deal is the second arranged by Allianz Real Estate in France. Earlier this year the German insurance group teamed up with Société Générale to provide a new €275 mln facility for the listed office giant Foncière des Régions. Allianz granted €200 mln of the seven-year loan at a fixed cost of 4%. The loan was used to finance nine office buildings let entirely to France Telecom.

In a recent interview with PropertyEU, the company’s new head of real estate financing in France Carole Tran Van Lieu said that Allianz aims to boost its French lending portfolio to between €500 and €700 mln in 2013. ‘We are targeting big lot sizes in Europe of between €100-200 mln,’ she said. ´A loan of €50 mln would be the absolute minimum.’

In December the group also recruited Bruno Dord, a former Société Générale debt specialist, as deputy head of financing for France and the Benelux.