real estate | Pension360

Canada Pension Fund Begins $1.3 Billion Spending Spree on Paris Real Estate

The Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System (OMERS) has made its first investment in what’s likely to be a line of many in Paris real estate.

The first purchase: a $337 million office building in central Paris. The pension fund says it plans to invest another $850 million in Paris real estate over the next three years.

Reported by the Financial Times:

Oxford Properties, the real estate arm of giant Ontario fund Omers, has bought a 237,000 sq ft building in Rue Blanche, central Paris, from the Carlyle Group for €263m.

Its move into Paris is the fund’s first step into continental European offices.

Michel Vauclair, an Oxford Properties senior vice-president, said it aimed to build up its Paris portfolio to €1bn in the next three years.

It will focus on “assets where we can drive value through active asset management . . . and where we believe that current values do not reflect future market improvements”, Mr Vauclair said.

Until recently the Paris property market has been sluggish, partly as a result of the country’s economic weakness and political uncertainty. But Mr Vauclair said that Oxford Properties sees “the prospect for significant growth to come through infrastructure improvements and a broader economic recovery”.

OMERS isn’t the only organization buying up Paris property. In fact, many foreign investors are flocking to the city. From the Financial Times:

Janet Stewart-Goatly, a senior capital markets director at property advisers CBRE, said the Paris market had seen a 60 per cent increase in transactions year-on-year as foreign investors flood into the market.

“If you’re looking to build up your international portfolio, you can’t ignore Paris,” she said. “There is a massive weight of capital seeking to invest.”

As a result yields are about 4 per cent for Paris’s central business district and 5.5 per cent in the La Defense business cluster, she added.

La Defense had a 12 per cent vacancy rate last year – partly as a result of a handful of large companies relocating to the Paris suburbs – but vacancies are now falling as more businesses take up space, Ms Stewart-Goatly said.

OMERS says it is targeting Paris due to an improving economy coupled with the likely leveling-off of its high vacancy rate, which the fund says is “temporary”.

Dallas Fund Loses Nearly $200 Million On Real Estate Ventures

The Dallas Police and Fire Pension System knew that its real estate losses were bad, but they didn’t learn the exact figures until a Thursday board meeting.

Trustees of the $3.3 billion pension fund learned Thursday that it has lost $196 million on real estate investments made in 2005 and later. Those losses were a big reason why the fund’s overall portfolio in 2013 returned just 4.4 percent.

Denmark Funds Ramp Up Alternative Investments

New government rules have led to a transformation in the asset allocation of Danish pension funds. Among the changes: more investments in alternatives. Reported by Reuters:

Pension funds in Denmark have had to gradually adapt to new solvency rules introduced by the Danish Financial Services Authority (FSA) since 2007, leading them to drop guarantees and take on more risk by investing in higher-yielding “alternative” assets, such as infrastructure projects, real estate and private equity funds.

Denmark’s top pension funds had on average invested 7 percent of their assets in alternative investments, excluding properties, by the end of 2012, the latest for which the Danish Financial Services Authority (FSA) has data for.

Out of the 152 billion Danish crowns ($26.4 billion) that the top funds had invested in alternative assets by end-2012, 59 billion crowns were in private equity funds, 44 billion in credit, 20 billion in infrastructure, 16 billion in agriculture and 13 billion in hedge funds.

As noted above, the average Denmark fund held 7 percent of their assets in alternatives in 2012.

The average U.S. fund holds 6.5 percent of its assets in alternatives, according to 2009 data from the Public Plans Database.

CalPERS, LACERS Ramp Up Real Estate Commitments

CalPERS already made headlines today for deciding to pull $4 billion from hedge funds and hedge funds-of-funds.

But there was another bit of news that was less headline-worthy, but still important: CalPERS has decided to invest an additional $1.3 billion in real estate funds, according to a report from Pensions & Investments:

The $298 billion California Public Employees’ Retirement System, Sacramento, added $600 million to Institutional Logistics Partners, a real estate partnership with Bentall Kennedy. CalPERS first invested $250 million in Institutional Logistics Partners in March 2013. The strategy seeks to invest in core industrial properties.

Separately, CalPERS added a total of $700 million to two real estate partnerships with GI Partners.

The pension fund added $400 million to TechCore and $300 million to CalEast Solstice. TechCore invests in “technology advantaged” properties in the U.S., such as data centers, Internet gateways, corporate campuses for technology tenants and life-science properties in U.S. metropolitan areas, according to a news release from CalPERS. The pension fund first invested $500 million in TechCore in May 2012. The size of the CalEast Solstice portfolio could not be learned by press time.

LACERS, meanwhile, is committing $190 million to real estate funds over the next two years, according to a separate Pensions & Investments report:

Los Angeles City Employees’ Retirement System plans to commit $140 million to four new open-end core real estate funds this year and make $50 million in additional commitments in 2015, minutes from the pension fund’s Aug. 26 board meeting show.

Townsend Group, real estate consultant for the $14.4 billion pension fund, is recommending the pension fund this year commit about $35 million each to Clarion Partners’ Lion Industrial Trust, Jamestown Premier Property Fund,Morgan Stanley(MS) Real Estate’s Prime Property Fund, and Principal Real Estate Investors’ U.S. Property Account.

The recommendations will be presented to the board for approval at a later meeting. The recommendation is part of the pension fund’s decision in May to double its exposure to core real estate to a 60% target and decrease non-core investments to 40% from 70%. LACERS has an overall 5% allocation to real estate, with $739 million funded as of March 31.

Photo by thinkpanama via Flickr CC License

Canada Pension Board to Open India Office

Pension360 covered last week the reported interest in Indian investments expressed by the Canadian Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB). Today, that interest became much clearer, as the CPPIB announced plans to open an India office in Mumbai.

More details from the Economic Times:

Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB), the giant pension fund that makes private-equity investments, plans to open an India office and has hired Kotak Realty Fund executive V Hari Krishna as a key member of its local team.

Krishna would join CPPIB in the coming month from the Kotak fund where he was a director for more than nine years, said two people having direct knowledge of the matter. He has also worked at real estate consultancy firms in the pat.

The proposed India office will be the second for CPPIB in an emerging market, indicating the fund’s growing focus on India where the economy is expected to turn around after two years of sub-5 per cent growth. “The India office will be set up in Mumbai in the next two-three quarters and CPPIB intends to do direct transaction over the next 12-18 months,” said one of the two people. “The fund has been looking to hire heads for real-estate, infrastructure and equities for India to drive investment.”

The pension fund refused to comment on office opening or recruitment in India, including of Krishna. “As a growing global investment organisation, we do look at expansion to more locations,” said Mark Machin, senior managing director and president of Asia at CPPIB. Krishna didn’t reply to a text message seeking comment.

The CPPIB appears to be primarily interested in Indian infrastructure and real estate investments. From the Economic Times:

In June this year, it offered to invest around $322 million in India’s infrastructure sector through L&T Infrastructure Development Projects, a unit of Larsen & Toubro.

It offered another $250 million in a strategic alliance with Piramal Enterprises to provide structured debt financing to residential projects across major urban centers this February, and a $200 million strategic alliance with the Shapoorji Pallonji group to acquire stabilised office buildings that are foreign-direct-investment compliant in late 2013.

“India is a key long-term growth market for CPPIB. The fund has committed approximately US $1.4 billion in India since 2010 and will continue to look to India for investments that fit with our long-term investment mandate,” CPPIB’s Machin said in an email response.

The CPPIB would not confirm or deny the plans for an India office.

Group Calls For Transparency In Canadian Pensions As Investment Expenses Rise

The Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB) has been an active investor in private equity, real estate and infrastructure around the world. Pension360 has covered Board’s endeavors into infrastructure and real estate in India and warehouses in California.

But those kinds of investments carry fees and expenses, and one Canadian think tank is calling on the CPPIB to make those expenses clearer. From CBC News:

The report, by former Statistics Canada chief economic analyst Philip Cross and Fraser Institute fellow Joel Emes, says the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board should more clearly explain the added costs of its new approach to investing.

Beginning in 2006, the CPPIB broadened its holdings beyond traditional stocks and bonds to invest in areas such as international real estate and infrastructure projects.

That new approach resulted in an additional $782 million for external management fees and $177 million on transaction fees, the authors say.

The CPPIB, which manages the funds not needed in the near term to pay Canada Pension Plan benefits, has moved away from traditional holdings because of low interest rates that keep bond returns low, according to CEO Mark Wiseman. In the past year, it has also invested selectively in stocks because of their high valuations.

Wiseman says the “active investment” approach is needed to create value “over an exceedingly long investment horizon” and to diversify the CPPIB portfolio.

The CPPIB has invested in infrastructure projects in countries such as Brazil and India and real estate portfolios in the U.S. and Australia.

The strategy led to returns of around 16 percent in 2013. But investment expenses have spiked as a result of the active management. From CBC:

The Fraser Institute argues the CPP has faced a big hike in the cost of its investments as a result of its new strategy — from $600 million or 0.54% of assets in 2006 to $2 billion or 1.15 per cent of its assets in 2013.

That figure includes the cost of collecting the CPP from Canadian paycheques and sending benefits to pensioners.

It is being less than transparent in failing to report its external management fees and transaction costs as part of CPPIB accounts, the report says. Instead those costs appear in federal government public accounts and overall accounts for CPP.

“The CPPIB needs to be more transparent about the expense of designing and implementing its investment strategy; every dollar spent on behalf of the CPP is one less dollar available to beneficiaries,” the Fraser Institute says.

External management fees might include investment banking fees, consulting fees, legal and tax advice and taxes on transfer of real estate, which would apply to the new style of investing, but might not be as high in stock and bond investing.

The Fraser Institute, the think tank that produced the report, advocates for smaller government and greater personal responsibility.

Pension Funds Attracted To India’s Infrastructure, Real Estate

Money is flowing into India as The Canada Pension Plan, along with a handful of other pension funds from around the globe, are increasingly investing in the country’s infrastructure and real estate. From the Financial Times:

CPPIB [Canada Pension Plan Investment Board] entered India in 2010 but has recently raised its profile with a series of deals involving long-term assets such as toll roads and residential property, creating a portfolio of planned investments worth $1.4bn that already ranks among the largest investments in the country by a foreign pension fund.

“Because it is a very small percentage [of the fund’s overall assets], clearly it is likely to grow, as India keeps growing and developing,” Mr [Mark] Machin, [international head of CPPIB] said.

“We will almost inevitably have more money focused on India. . . It is one of the most important markets for us in the region,” he added.

[…]

In June, CPPIB announced a $332m infrastructure investment partnership with a division of Larsen & Toubro, India’s largest engineering group by sales. That followed deals to invest in real estate with two family-owned conglomerates, the Piramal and Shapoorji Pallonji groups.

The fund has also built up large portfolios in Australia and China, with deals worth $5.9bn and $4.1bn respectively, in assets ranging from property development to logistics.

The Canada Pension Plan is one of many pension funds turning its focus to India. From FirstBiz:

Many sovereign and pension funds are pumping funds into the Indian real estate like All Pensions Group (APG Group), Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA), Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB), State General Reserve Fund of Oman (SGRF) and GIC of Singapore.

It’s no coincidence that investment interest has perked up following the election of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Mr. Modi has said he’ll lift some restrictions on foreign investment and kick-start a new wave of infrastructure projects.

A Global Perspective on Pension Fund Investments in Real Estate

A lack of research into the cost, investment approach and performance of pension fund real estate investments globally has led to an incomplete understanding of the true performance of real estate investments. Previous studies have focused only on property indices, specific buildings and REITs.

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