Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) was the top dealmaker in European real estate investment during the first quarter of 2015, with an outlay of €4.7 bn to gain control of two of the largest office-led estates in Europe.

Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) was the top dealmaker in European real estate investment during the first quarter of 2015, with an outlay of €4.7 bn to gain control of two of the largest office-led estates in Europe.

Qatar's sovereign wealth fund, which has an estimated €236 bn of assets under management, paid out more than the combined total for next investors in the ranking, according to preliminary deal data compiled by PropertyEU Research.

At end-February QIA acquired the 60% it did not already own in the 290,000 m2 Porta Nuova mixed-use development in downtown Milan for an estimated €1.2 bn. Around the same time QIA and North American investor Brookfield Property Partners obtained backing for their €3.5 bn bid for Songbird Estates, the majority owner of Canary Wharf Group, which in turn owns the majority of the Canary Wharf office estate in London.

The next three places in the provisional dealmakers' ranking, based on reported transactions for Q1, are occupied by US private equity firm Starwood Capital Group (€1.7 bn), Canadian pension investor CPPIB (€1.5 bn) and UK insurer Legal & General (€1.3 bn).

See PropertyEU’s Top Investors App for a ranking of the main dealmakers in Europe during 2014.