Vasakronan sold to AP Fastigheter for EUR 4.3bn

The Swedish government has sold real estate firm Vasakronan to AP Fastigheter in a deal which values its assets at SEK 41.2bn (EUR 4.3bn), the company said on Thursday. The government intends to use the proceeds to pay off public debt.

Fastigheter, the real estate arm of Sweden's state pension funds, will assume some SEK 16.5bn of Vasakronan's debt and other commitments, leaving the state with proceeds of SEK 24.6bn. The Swedish government will sell its shares in Civitas Holding, the parent company of Vasakronan. Certain properties of national interest have been excluded from the deal and were transferred to Specialfastigheter, another state-owned company, last month.

'Today we can present a deal that is good for Vasakronan and for Swedish households,' Sweden's minister for local government and financial markets Mats Odell said at a press conference announcing the deal. 'AP Fastigheter is a solid long-term owner, which made an offer that after an overall assessment is the best and represents the higher price of the two final offers.'

According to press agency Reuters, Swedish media earlier this month reported that there were only two bidders in the final running to buy Vasakronan - AP Fastigheter and a consortium of funds made up of Whitehall and Blackstone from the US and Areim from Sweden.

JP Morgan acted as financial adviser to the Swedish government on the transaction. Legal and accounting advice was provided by Advokatfirman Cederquist and Ohrlings PricewaterhouseCoopers respectively.