Blackstone enters race for Australia’s shopping-centre owner Centro Group
29 Dec 2010
Private equity firm Blackstone Group, which has a corpus of $100 billion under management, has reportedly entered the fray to buy the world's third-largest shopping centre property owner, Centro Properties Group.
Blackstone has made a preliminary offer for Centro's 600 US properties before Centro's 17 December deadline, in what is likely to be one of the largest property takeover battles of 2011, The Wall Street Journal today said, citing people familiar with the matter.
Melbourne-based Centro is the second-largest retail property owner in Australia and the third-largest shopping centre owner in the US.
Its portfolio of shopping malls consisting of over 682 properties in the US and 112 properties in Australia and New Zealand is worth around A$18.6 billion ($18.8 billion).
The company's financial troubles began in 2007 after it piled up massive debts arising from a series of debt-funded acquisitions in the US and Australia.
As of last month, Centro had debts of A$18.4 billion, of which, A$11.5 billion need refinancing by the end of December 2011.
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