UK-based property investment fund Lanebridge Investment Management (LIM) has bought out Active Asset Investment Management’s (AAIM) stake in Budapest’s Arena Plaza shopping centre to make it the sole owner, LIM investment director Simon Smethurst said on Wednesday.
LIM agreed to buy AAIM’s 50pc stake in Arena Plaza at the end of 2007, but did not take an active role in the management of the shopping centre until October 2008. The sale was closed on June 26, 2009. Hungary’s MKB Bank was the main financer for the acquisition of the stake.
Mr Smethurst declined to reveal the purchase price.
When LIM took over the management of Arena Plaza, it concentrated on marketing, resulting a 25pc rise in visitor numbers in June over the same month a year earlier. Between 65pc and 70pc of retailers in the centre reported a rise in profit during the period.
About 97.5pc of Arena Plaza’s 66,000 square metres of retail space is rented out. Just 13 of 200 storefronts stand empty.
LIM is 51pc owned by NM Rothschild and Sons commercial bank. The rest of the fund’s owners are investment professionals. The fund manages assets worth more than EUR 1bn.