Record year of brick investments Amancio Ortega. The founder and largest shareholder of Inditex has invested around 2,760 million euros this year through Pontegadea, according to the calculations of this newspaper with the information revealed from its large operations. The last known acquisition of him has been that of a luxury skyscraper in Seattle (USA) for around 300 million euros, as it was learned yesterday. Never before have I invested so much in the same year.
The last trophy for the Galician businessman has been the tower Kiara in Seattle. It is his second foray into residential rentals, after the purchase of tower 19 Dutch in Manhattan was also closed in October in the US market, for which he paid almost 500 million.
In this way, Pontegadea continues to strengthen itself in the US, a stable market, in addition to diversifying its portfolio by reinforcing the residential leg, since this real estate agency has traditionally invested in office buildings and premises in the main commercial axes, as well as hotels.
In addition to the acquisition of the Kiara building and 19 Dutch in Manhattan (the first operation in the luxury rental housing business), we must add the strong commitment to logistics in the United States. Through its family office Pontegadea, the billionaire starred in his largest historical investment by acquiring seven logistics centers in the US states of Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Tennessee, South Carolina, Virginia and Texas in recent months, for which he disbursed around 900 million to the real estate company Realty Income Corp. These ships are leased to operators such as Amazon, Home Depot, Nestlé or Fedex, among others.
In addition, among the frenetic activity in Pontegadea this year there is also interest in the European headquarters of Goal (Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram), located in Dublin. In September it was learned that it is negotiating to acquire that office complex for 550 million, but the operation has not yet been closed.
Your biggest purchase
Ortega already started the year stomping. In January he made his biggest acquisition of a single asset, taking over the office complex Royal Bank Plaza, located in downtown Toronto (Canada), for about 1,150 million Canadian dollars, just over 800 million euros at the exchange rate at that time. The family office acquired this asset from two Canadian pension funds. Specifically, the municipal employees of Ontario and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board.
In April, Pontegadea opted for Scotland by acquiring in the glasgow city center an office building under construction for about 240 million.
Ortega’s strong investment coincides with the largest dividend in the history of Inditex, a group in which he controls 59.294% of the capital. The textile group has distributed 2,898 million in 2022 among its shareholders, of which 1,718 million have gone to the founder of Zara, who basically make real estate purchases with their own resources and only circumstantially and in a small proportion, finance part of the purchase of buildings with credit. In addition, he reinvests a significant portion of Pontegadea’s own profits. Last year, this real estate agency obtained 647 million in rental income.
Other assets
Although most of the dividends are reinvested in real estate assets for leasing, it has also recently diversified into renewable energy and telecommunications. At the end of July it was learned that he had invested 27 million to take control of 49% of the Kappa photovoltaic complex, operated by Repsol in Manzanares (Ciudad Real). On the same date, he acquired 5% of the capital of Enagás Renovable, for 3.5 million.
Thanks to these purchases, Pontegadea has become the largest real estate agency in the country by assets ahead of Merlin and Colonial. At the end of 2021, that portfolio it reached a valuation of 15,264 million, its highest valuation, with an interannual growth of 8.4%. Predictably, the 2,760 million investment this year will have to be added to his portfolio.
The businessman, with a fortune valued at 63,100 million according to Forbeshas historically opted for unique, large and well-located assets in the main cities of the world for its real estate purchases, as is the case with its new trophy in Seattle.
Since the year the pandemic began, Pontegadea’s investment had been more modest. 2020 was a year without known investments and in 2021 it accelerated with more than 450 million disbursed, although it sold its stake in the Telxius towers for 710 million. That year it entered renewables by acquiring 49% of Repsol’s Delta wind farm for 245 million.
The previous year, 2019, was, however, very fruitful for the businessman, since he spent more than 2,000 million in assets in London and, precisely, in Seattle.
Kiara’s Purchase
The tower that Ortega is acquiring now has 41 stories and is located north of downtown Seattle, at 111 Terry Avenue. The building has 461 apartments for rent, which include one to three-bedroom apartments. The skyscraper was designed by the Weber Thompson studio and completed in 2018. Since 2020 it was in the hands of the Canadian fund Oxford Properties Group, which bought it for around 320 million dollars (301 million euros, at current exchange rates), according to the local media The Registry. In addition, it has a commercial area of 1,500 square meters.
The seller of the Kiara building is that Toronto fund with a multinational presence and which manages 82,000 million dollars in real estate assets, with capital mainly from the Canadian pension fund Omers, linked to Ontario officials.
Another relevant acquisition of Pontegadea in Seattle
Amazon. It is not the first time that Ortega landed in Seattle. The founder of Inditex became Amazon’s landlord in that city by buying part of the e-commerce giant’s headquarters in the Troy Block complex, for around 655 million euros. So the seller was USAA Real Estate, the real estate arm of the insurer linked to the US Army.
Goal. Two years later, he paid Vulcan (the real estate company created by Paul Allen, the late Microsoft co-founder) around $380 million for Arbor Blocks to become Meta’s landlord.
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