On an - understandably - quiet day for company news, shopping centre owner Intu Properties has unveiled a €451m Spanish acquisition.
The company is buying the Puerto Venecia shopping centre and retail park in Zaragoza, in a move to take advantage of the recovering Spanish economy. It said:
The centre has opened only recently and is seeing strong growth in footfall and retail sales from key names.
[It] was let and opened during a difficult period for the Spanish economy and the rental levels are not regarded as demanding, indicating scope for increases as the market recovers and the centre becomes fully established in its region.
Intu and its Spanish development partner Eurofund have options on four sites in Malaga, Valencia, Palma and Vigo. It said the Puerto Venecia deal strengthens its position in Spain ahead of embarking on the first of these four projects, likely to be at the Malaga site.
Intu chief executive David Fischel said:
[This] transaction substantially accelerates our activities in Spain, which is a country where we see major opportunities for the type of genuinely regional destination centre in which the group specialises, like intu Trafford Centre in the UK.
Puerto Venecia represents such an asset, with an attractive combination of retail, restaurants and leisure. The centre is seeing strong growth in footfall and retailer sales from key names and provides an excellent template for the future development of sites we have under option, such as in Malaga where we expect to move the project forward significantly in 2015.
In the market Intu shares have dipped 2.4p to 336.1p.
