Hyundai Investments buys office building in Brussels

South Korean asset manager Hyundai Investments Co., fully owned by Hyundai Marine & Fire Insurance Co., has said it acquired a Brussels-based office building earlier this month. Through the deal, the Korean investment firm deployed all the committed capital in its first blind pool fund for global real estate.

The property dubbed City Garden is located in Leopold Quarter, home to the European Commission, the EU Parliament and global businesses. Details on the fund size and the deal were not disclosed.

The blind pool fund, Hyundai Investment Global Real Estate 19, was created at the end of 2019 by the Korean asset manager and Paris-headquartered La Française Real Estate Managers. La Française is in charge of deal sourcing and asset management.

Last year, the two asset managers set up a joint venture, dubbed HILF Euro Office JV, to manage the blind pool fund investing in medium-sized modern offices located in business districts in Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and Ireland. In October 2020, the JV made its first investment by acquiring the headquarters of energy firm RWE AG located in Essen, Germany. The deal was based on a sale-and-leaseback transaction with RWE, Europe's third-largest firm in renewable energy, with a lease contract for 17 and a half years.

Before that, Hyundai Investments and the French asset manager jointly acquired a seven-story office building Le Balthazar, located in Saint-Denis in the northern suburbs of Paris, for €235 million ($266.3 million) in 2018. Hyundai raised 135 billion won ($113.8 million) from three Korean securities companies BNK Securities Co., Hana Financial Investment Co. and HMC Investment Securities Co., while the French firm raised 15 billion won. 

In 2017, the two investment firms jointly acquired an office complex leased to Belgian electric utility company Electrabel GDF Suez SA, located in Brussels.

The blind pool fund, compared with its project funds, enabled Hyundai Investments to make a quicker investment decision, the asset management firm said. Hyundai Investments is considering the creation of its second blind pool fund for global real estate, the company stated.

Write to A-Young Yoon at youngmoney@hankyung.com
Jihyun Kim edited this article.