Apollo and Blackstone shopped for income while Oaktree and Blackstone sought fresh opportunistic equity and Oaktree lined up an Irish trophy for sale.
Apollo spent €1 bn on a 30% stake in a Vonovia portfolio of 21,000 German homes, on behalf of insurance and other long-term investor clients. The deal gives Apollo’s clients resilient long-term income and it helps listed Vonovia raise half the €2 bn it has set itself to find this year to cover upcoming debt maturities.
Blackstone bought its second UK industrial and logistics portfolio this month, picking up prime Manchester estates in Trafford Park and Heywood Park from smaller US private equity firm Harbert for about £480 mln. Blackstone is also aiming for a first close in the next two months on its seventh European opportunity fund, BREP VII.
Oaktree announced it has raised €1.2 bn for a Western Europe debt fund; it’s also in the news for appointing agents in Dublin to explore a sale of The Square in Tallaght, after acquiring a controlling interest in the scheme, five years after first buying it for €250 mln in 2017. The shopping centre has 118 shops and it also has 19 acres of surface car parking with potential for residential development.
In the finance markets, the focus by borrowers on securing refinancing packages to nail down debt costs continues. LXi REIT, which invests in mixed-use, long-term and inflation linked properties, is the latest to complete a very large transaction; the UK group now has eight debt facilities with a range of debt maturities from two to sixteen years and an all-in capped rate of 4.7%. In addition to a club of UK banks, its longest facility, at an LTV of 40%, for 16-years and fixed at 5.8%, is from insurer Canada Life.
The latest Bayes UK Lending report, published this week, found that a record high proportion of lending - 65% - is going on refinancing.
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