Consortium of Canadian Pensions to Buy London City Airport

A group of Canadian institutional investors – including the Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System and the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan – has agreed to buy the London City Airport.

The purchase price is just south of $3 billion, according to a source who talked to the New York Times.

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The airport, which handled flights for 4.3 million passengers in 2015, is relatively close to the City of London, the traditional home of London’s financial community, and to Canary Wharf, where many of the world’s biggest banks have their London offices.

Terms of the transaction were not disclosed, but a person with knowledge of the discussions, who was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly and who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the purchase price was more than 2 billion pounds, or about $2.8 billion.

“London City Airport is a premium infrastructure company, operating in a very attractive market,” the consortium said in a news release. “We look forward to working closely with the airport’s strong management team to achieve the business’s full long-term potential.”

As well as the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan, the consortium includes the Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System; Alberta Investment Management Corporation, a Canadian institutional investment manager; and Wren House Infrastructure Management, a unit of the Kuwait Investment Authority.

The Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan is no stranger to airports; it holds stakes in three other airports around Europe.

Photo by Christian Junker via Flickr CC License