Bonn-based property group IVG Immobilien has confirmed it has hired financial advisor Rothschild ‘to explore various options’ for the future of its institutional real estate business Triuva.
An IPO or a sale are the two key alternatives, a spokesman for IVG said, but stressed that the exploratory process was still in an early phase. At this stage IVG has no preference for either option, he added. ‘The process was only launched a week ago.’
International interest in Triuva, which has assets under management of around €10 bn, is expected to be strong and a sale involving more than one buyer is an option that may be considered, the spokesman said. He said it was ‘too early’ to talk about a potential timeline for the process.
A spin-off would effectively reduce IVG to a shell company focusing on just one remaining corporate entity, Storag Etzel, which bundles together IVG’s old cavern operations as well as its gas and oil portfolio. IVG’s core office operations have already been spun out as OfficeFirst and were subsequently sold to US alternative investment giant Blackstone for €3.3 bn. That deal was finalised in April this year.
The former institutional business of IVG was rebranded as Triuva in September 2015 as part of a process to extract it from the legacy of IVG’s insolvency. Since then Triuva has been pitching itself as a provider and manager of structured real estate products for institutional investors.
In addition to its traditional client base in Germany and Austria, it has also been expanding in new geographies such as the Netherlands and Scandinavia, the company CEO’s Wenzel Hoberg told PropertyEU recently in an interview. Earlier this year, Triuva sourced a portfolio of nine Italian high street retail properties for €120 mln on behalf of a Dutch institutional client of CBRE Global Investment Partners (CBRE GIP). The client is believed to be PGGM.
Triuva focuses in particular on commercial properties in the office, retail and logistics sector in Europe. One of the assets in its portfolio is the former headquarters of the ECB in Frankfurt (pictured).
