Investments, Legislation, Lithuania, Markets and Companies, Mergers and take-overs, Real Estate, Retail

Vilniaus Prekyba said that it had bought Akropolis Group, Akropolis Real Estate and Nikola Mushanov Projektas – the companies that own or control the Akropolis malls and other real estate, from Malta-registered Relvit.

According to Vilniaus Prekyba Director Raimonda Kiziene, all related retail and real estate businesses will now be under single control. Vilniaus Prekyba will also help the Akropolis operations to solve their new project financing issues.

Vilniaus Prekyba had planned to purchase the assets from Relvit back in 2015, but the deal was put on hold after Mindaugas Marcinkevicius, a minority shareholder of Relvit and the so-called VP Group, filed suits with courts in Lithuania and Malta.

Nerijus Numavicius, who is thought to be Lithuania's richest person, is the largest indirect shareholder of both Relvit and Vilniaus Prekyba.

Real property market experts say that the sale of the Akropolis mall portfolio, closed on Wednesday, was the largest ever deal in the Baltic countries, but note that it was a transaction between related parties and will have no impact on the market.

Saulius Vagonis, head of the Valuation and Market Research Unit at the real estate services company Ober-Haus, says that the 400-million-euro deal, in which Lithuanian and foreign companies that own the Akropolis shopping centers and plan projects for them, is twice as big as the commercial real estate market's previous record limit of 200 million euros.

"Speaking about the sum of money, it is really impressive. The value of the largest commercial property transactions in the Baltic countries so far, including the sale of the Akropolis in Kaunas, the sale of SEB's property portfolio to Homburg or Partners Group's acquisition of BPT Optima's portfolio, was up to 200 million euros," he told BNS.

However, the analyst thinks that the sale of the malls and their project portfolio will have no impact on the market.

"You can hardly call it a market transaction, because it was concluded between the same buy and seller. The assets did not go outside the existing shareholder. It will have no impact on the market," he said.

In Vagonis' opinion, Vilniaus Prekyba, the buyer of the assets, has a significant potential for developing new projects on the acquired land in Vilnius, Riga, Tallinn and Sofia.

Arnoldas Antanavicius, head of the Investment and Analysis Department at the real estate firm Inreal, says that the price paid for the Akropolis portfolio seems to be somewhat too high.

"Compared with the price of other retail transactions, the Akropolis malls appear, at least at the first glance, overpriced. However, we have no information about the (rental income) flows and we can't make an adequate comparison. I believe, however, that the price would not be attractive to an outside buyer," he told BNS.

According to the analyst, there is room for another mall in Vilnius and, therefore, the land purchased by Vilniaus Prekyba has a potential for development.