Homeplus shopping pain will resist Korean IPO cure

Frasers Centrepoint Trust

22/02/2019 01:45

(The author is a Reuters Breakingviews columnist. The opinions
expressed are his own.)
    By Alec Macfarlane
    HONG KONG, Feb 22 (Reuters Breakingviews) - Asian buyout
firm MBK will list some of the hypermarket buildings it bought
from Tesco. This $1.5 bln REIT should fly in yield-hungry Seoul.
Yet the split could make it harder to sell the rest. Separating
property and operating units was a boom-era trick that ended
badly.
    Full view will be published shortly.
    On Twitter https://twitter.com/AlecMac11
 
    CONTEXT NEWS
    - Homeplus, the South Korean hypermarket chain controlled by
investors led by Asian private equity firm MBK Partners, has
filed for an initial public offering of a real estate investment
trust (REIT) that could raise up to 1.7 trillion won ($1.5
billion).
    - Korea Retail Home Plus REIT I (KRH) will offer almost 346
million shares within a price range of 4,530 won and 5,000 won
each, raising between 1.6 trillion won and 1.7 trillion won in
total, according to a term sheet.
    - Proceeds from the offering will be combined with debt
financing to buy 51 hypermarket properties from Homeplus for up
to 4.3 trillion won.
    - Homeplus plans to launch a roadshow to sell shares in the
offering on Feb. 28. The stock is set to begin trading in Seoul
on March 29. Citigroup and Goldman Sachs are global coordinators
of the IPO.
    - MBK led a group of investors including Canada Pension Plan
Investment Board and Singapore state investment fund Temasek to
buy Homeplus from U.K. retailer Tesco in 2015 for an enterprise
value of 4.2 billion pounds.
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click on  MAC/ 
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    <^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
S. Korea's Homeplus files for up to $1.5 bln REIT IPO - term
sheet     urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL3N2031LP
BREAKINGVIEWS- Korean conglomerate accentuates the discount   
 urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL3N1XA0NE
BREAKINGVIEWS - Private equity battens on the Asian state   
 urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL4N1XQ16P
    ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^>
 (Editing by Una Galani and Sharon Lam)
 ((alec.macfarlane@thomsonreuters.com; Reuters Messaging:
alec.macfarlane.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net))