The sale of a portfolio of IBRC loans with a par value of €7.3 billion was completed yesterday by KPMG, the special liquidators of the former Anglo Irish Bank.
Projects Rock and Salt, comprising commercial real estate loans written through the UK branch and subsidiaries of IBRC, were 85 per cent sold to Lone Star, an American investment fund. Sankaty Advisors LLC/Canyon Capital Advisors LLC bought most of the remainder.
Lone Star is understood to have paid between €3.65 billion and €4.86 billion for its loans with a face value of €6.68 billion, making it the single biggest deal since Anglo was nationalised in 2009.
In total Lone Star has taken control of 300 borrower connections or 1,300 individual loans relating to 1,500 assets. About 75 per of the loans relate to the UK with the remainder in Germany and the United States.
Among the loans Lone Star acquired are those related to Dragon's Den star Duncan Bannatyne's health chain Bannatyne Fitness and two large British hotel groups – Somerston Hotels and Puma Hotels. Finance to Lone Star was provided by Citi, RBC and Wells Fargo.
The exact composition of the loans acquired by Lone Star versus other bidders was not immediately clear yesterday. Among the assets known to be in Project Rock is a loan secured against Stadium of Light, the football ground of Premier League team Sunderland, owned by Ellis Short, the former managing director of Lone Star's Asia Pacific business.
Subject to legal completion, none of the IBRC loan assets within these books are expected to transfer to the National Asset Management Agency (Nama).
"I am extremely pleased with the progress made by the Special Liquidators to date in relation to the disposal of assets in IBRC," Minister for Finance Michael Noonan said.
“The sale of this entire portfolio on top of the success of the Project Evergreen sale late last year will considerably reduce the amount of assets that are now expected to transfer to Nama and bodes well for the ultimate success of the liquidation,” he added.
Lone Star has previously acquired a large part of Anglo Irish Bank’s US property loan portfolio and Allied Irish Bank’s Project Kildare loan portfolio with a nominal value of €650 million.
