Norway Wealth Fund Beefs Up Logistics Portfolio
The move comes after Norges decided to scale back its real estate push and focus more on buying stakes in listed real estate companies.
(Bloomberg) Norway’s sovereign wealth fund, the world’s largest, added to holdings of logistics buildings in the US and Europe, betting against any escalation of the ongoing trade war.
Norges Bank Investment Management acquired three buildings in the U.S. and four in Europe in partnership with Prologis, it said in a statement on Thursday.
The $1 trillion fund paid $55.6 million for a 45 percent stake in three properties in Orange County, California and 69.1 million euros for a 50 percent stake in four properties in Barcelona, Madrid and Tilburg, the Netherlands.
Western Realco and Penwood Capital were the sellers of the US properties, which has a total leasable area of 663,257 square feet.
Prologis was the seller of the European buildings, which had a total leasable area of 74,579 square meters.
A Focus on Listed Real Estate
The move also comes after the investor in February decided to scale back its real estate push and focus more on buying stakes in listed real estate companies. That decision was seen as a way to cut costs and simplify the approach after struggling to find properties with prices near record levels. The fund lowered its target for real estate in its portfolio to 3 to 5 percent from 7 percent earlier.
By the end of 2018, the fund had invested 246 billion kroner ($28 billion) in unlisted real estate, or about 3 percent of the fund’s value. Unlisted real estate returned 7.5 percent last year.
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