Click to play at Crystal Palace Online Casino
/News/

GE Real Estate Central Europe Acquires 16 Polish Casino

GE Real Estate Central Europe has acquired 16 Casino hypermarkets throughout Poland from Groupe Casino, the French supermarket chain in a 100 percent equity transaction. The deal is part of Groupe Casino's exit from Poland, in which it sold nearly all its real estate to GE and its retail operations to Metro Group.

Kim Habra, managing director of Central Europe for GE noted the significance of this deal is that it follows GE's transaction in 2003 with casinos in which it bought 13 separate retail galleries, or centers, connected to the Casino hypermarkets in Poland for 220 million Euros ($275 million). GE currently owns nine of the galleries. "That was a landmark deal for us, the largest in Central Europe at the time," he said. "We tried hard to buy the hypermarkets then. It's been a very good investment as cap rates have compressed significantly."

The 16 hypermarket centers are in well-populated secondary cities around Poland, including Gdansk, Krakow, Lodz, Wroclaw and Zabrze. Habra added that by owning 100 percent of the hypermarket center today, GE can better reconfigure the retail space, which currently is close to 100 percent leased, and can achieve better liquidity synergies.

GE's Central European portfolio now has reached $1.7 billion, with retail compromising 80 percent of the properties. "We believe retail offers significant growth opportunity in the region," Habra said. "Spending per capital in Poland and in Central and Eastern Europe is increasing and rents are below those in Western Europe."

 

Tuesday, September 19 , 2006
Gerald Kernighan