Mitiska raises €41m for new retail investment arm

Mitiska Ventures, the real estate investment management arm of Belgian group Mitiska, has raised €41 mln for its first retail international vehicle targeting retail warehouse assets in Europe.

The company said it has committed €10 mln to FRI, with the rest of the funds being provided by a range of Belgian, Dutch, Luxembourg and Swiss private and institutional investors including private lender Banque Thaler and Korys, the investment structure of the Colruyt family.

Mitiska aims to grow the size of FRI to €75 mln at final closing, enabling it to invest up to around €200 mln in the European retail warehouse niche.

The company, which is structured as a closed-end club deal, has made its first acquisition with the purchase of a project pipeline representing a total investment volume of around €100 mln. The developments have been contributed to FRI by Mitiska as a seed portfolio and represent a 9 - 10% yield on investment.

In addition, FRI is also working on new opportunistic and value-added investments. It will target an exposure of 50% to both Western and 50% to Central & Eastern Europe, the company said.

'As the retail warehouse market is mainly locally driven, investments outside of Belgium will in principle be undertaken in partnership with experienced local country partners,' it noted. FRI has an exclusive country partnership agreement with Alpha Property Development for Romania, and discussions are underway relating to other countries.

FRI will apply a conservative leverage strategy of maximum 50% loan-to-value, with the aim to provide its investors with a regular cash return of 3 - 6% per annum, together with long-term capital appreciation resulting in a total IRR of 10 – 15%.

Alfred Bouckaert, ex-CEO AXA Northern Europe and current chairman of the Board at Belfius Bank, has been appointed as the chairman of FRI's board of directors.

'FRI is building up a balanced retail warehouse portfolio offering long-term, inflation-linked income from high quality tenants, with the added security of good quality underlying real estate,' said Luc Geuten, chairman of Mitiska Ventures.