CTT chooses Sonae Sierra to manage real estate assets

  • ECO News
  • 19 September 2022

The official announcement should be made in early November, as CTT CEO João Bento told journalists last week.

Sonae Sierra is the company that will manage CTT’s real estate assets, according to ECO. The postal company announced in June its intention to create a vehicle to hold and manage real estate assets, totalling 410 retail and logistics properties, valued at around €134 million. The official announcement should be made in early November, as CTT CEO João Bento told journalists last week.

On June 20, CTT said it had started “exclusive negotiations” with a co-investor to create a vehicle – in which the postal operator will maintain a majority stake – to own and manage its real estate assets.

The entity of this investor was not disclosed, but ECO has found out from sources in the real estate market that Sonae Sierra was the company chosen to manage this vehicle. Last week, during an event, CEO João Bento told journalists that the deal was not yet closed but that it should happen before or during the presentation of the quarterly results, which will take place on November 3 or 4.

To create this structure, CTT will incorporate the assets portfolio into the new vehicle. Sonae Sierra will manage it and seek new investors (institutional and family offices) to take a minority position, the postal company explained at the time.

Of the 410 real estate assets, 400 are part of the “Income Portfolio”, composed of shops located in the centre of localities and warehouses and logistics/distribution centres of CTT. This portfolio, valued at €110 million, represents a gross leasable area of approximately 240 thousand square metres and includes “potential expansion opportunities, namely in the logistics network, in Portugal and Spain”.

CTT thus aims to set up a structure to maximise the value of the “Income Portfolio” by optimising its current management, improving occupation with the attraction of new tenants and seeking micro-development opportunities in cases where these may be considered to exist.

The remaining ten properties are in the “Development Portfolio”, valued at €24 million. These are properties located in areas with potential for mixed-use development projects and may become “shortly” non-essential to logistics networks.

ECO tried to confirm this information with CTT and Sonae Sierra, but both refused to comment.