Blackstone-Group Nexus files DRHP papers with SEBI
Global investment establishment Blackstone– patronized Nexus Select Trust has filed the draft paper with request controller Sebi to launch India’s first public issue of retail REIT to raise around USD 500 million, sources said. Nexus Select Trust has a portfolio of 17 functional shopping promenades across 14 major metropolises, covering about 10 million square bases of area valued at around USD 3 billion.
As per the sources, Nexus Select Trust has on Thursday filed the Draft Red Herring Prospectus (DRHP) with the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) and is looking to hit the capital request with India’s first retail REIT (Real Estate Investment Trust) public issue in the first half of the 2023 timetable time.
The size of the original public offer (IPO) of Nexus Select Trust REIT will be around USD 500 million, they added. This will be the third REIT patronized by Blackstone. It had before launched India’s first REIT — Embassy Office Parks REIT – and also Mindspace Business Parks REIT.
The REIT, a popular instrument encyclopedically, was introduced in India many times ago to attract investment in the real estate sector by monetizing rent- yielding means. It helps unleash the massive value of real estate means and enables the participation of retail investors. At present, there are three listed REITs — Embassy Office Parks REIT, Mindspace Business Parks REIT and Brookfield India Real Estate Trust — on Indian stock exchanges but all these are leased office assets. Nexus Select Trust will be the first REIT with rent- yielding retail real estate means.
In its portfolio of 10 million square bases of retail real estate, Nexus Select Trust has also included Select City walk boardwalk in south Delhi. There are around 3,000 stores in its shopping promenades while the number of brands is roughly 1,000. The sources said Blackstone is veritably bullish on the growth story of India’s retail sector, which has bounced back sprucely post the alternate surge of the Covid epidemic.
“The abecedarian of India’s retail business is veritably strong. People are spending plutocrat and watching pictures,” a source said. Unlike the office member, there aren’t numerous players in the shopping promenades business and also the force of Grade A promenades is also limited, the sources said. On the functional front, the residency position in the promenades presently stands at 94 per cent with an periodic footfall of over 130 million, they said.
The deals in its promenades during the April- June quarter have been 24 per cent more than the pre-Covid level. Nexus Select Trust has done leasing of around 3.5 million square bases over the last three times and three months. Its elderly operation platoon conforming of nine CXOs (with 20 times average experience) led by Dalip Sehgal (former superintendent director of Unilever India) as CEO is supported by over 500 workers.
The board of directors is largely diversified and educated. The crucial board members are Michael Holland (ex-CEO of the Embassy REIT), Arjun Sharma (Chairman and Director of the Select Group), Jayesh Merchant (ex-CFO of Asian maquillages), Sadashiv Rao (Former Director of IDFC) and Tuhin Parikh (Head of BX India Real Estate).
Blackstone has a real estate portfolio of 85 means totaling 150 million square bases across the office, retail and logistics parts.
In the office, Blackstone is inclusively one of India’s largest office landlords (41 means totaling 101 million square bases), while in logistics and artificial space, Blackstone is one of India’s largest warehousing landlords (21 means totaling 38 million square bases). Blackstone has lately set up a completely- possessed platform ‘Lumina’ to invest in data centers across Asia, with an original focus on India.
India’s first REIT of Rs4,750 crore issue size was listed in April 2019 by Embassy Office Parks, patronized by Blackstone and garden establishment Embassy Group. In August 2020, K Raheja and Blackstone- patronized Mindspace Business Parks launched the country’s alternate REIT to raise Rs4,500 crore. Global investment establishment Brookfield has listed the country’s third REIT after raising Rs3,800 crore through an IPO.