Spain's Banco Santander has postponed the sale of the real estate assets held by its EUR 2.6 bn Banif property fund due to lack of investor demand.
Spain's Banco Santander has postponed the sale of the real estate assets held by its EUR 2.6 bn Banif property fund due to lack of investor demand.
In a statement to the stock market regulator CNMV, the lender said that the sale process has been postponed to 2011 because of the 'illiquid and depressed state' of the Spanish property investment market.
The lack of any 'reasonable offers' for properties earmarked for sale prompted Santander's decision to halt the fund liquidation, which was initially due to start in the second half of the year.
The decision by Santander coincides with the Spanish government's announcement that it will introduce more flexibility in the liquidation terms for real estate funds.
Santander hired CB Richard Ellis in April last year to manage the sale of 90% of Banif's portfolio. The vehicle - Spain's largest real estate fund - had been frozen since February 2009 due to a wave of investor redemptions. Santander was granted a two-year suspension on reimbursements from the fund and plans were to immediately 'start an orderly programme of disposals'.
In March last year, Banif sold an office building on Paseo de la Castellana in Madrid to the Spanish public insurance group Consorcio de Compensación de Seguros for around EUR 70 mln. Shortly after it divested its landmark property, the Plenilunio shopping centre in Madrid to private equity group Orion Capital Managers for a total of EUR 235 mln.