BAML launches €286.4m Italian CMBS

Bank of America Merrill Lynch has launched the first European CMBS deal of 2015, a €286.4m securitisation of Italian assets owned by three private equity borrowers.

Retail centres owned by Blackstone and Orion Capital Managers and offices by Cerberus Capital Management make up the collateral. All three investors were early into the recovering Italian real estate market.

The five-year deal, Taurus 2015-1 IT, is the first European CMBS of 2015, with the market predicting an uptick this year. Last year there were 12 European deals which raised just over €4bn of finance.

Secured against 14 office and retail assets owned by the three sponsors, the loans have an average LTV of 62.5%, valuing the portfolio at €452.24m. The average occupancy is 87.8% and the average unexpired lease length, 3.9 years.

Taurus 2015-1 IT is to be rated by Fitch Ratings and DBRS and is expected to price next week. BAML will retain at least 5% in each class of notes. It will have the following capital structure:

The assets owned by Orion are three shopping centres anchored by Emisfero hypermarkets, the chain owned by Gruppo Unicomm;  Orion bought the malls for €198.8m in December. BAML advanced a €120m loan against Palladio Shopping Center in Vicenza, Emisfero in Fiume Veneto and Emisfero in Monfalcone, priced at just under 300 bps.

Blackstone’s loan relates to its €123.7m purchase in November of the Fashion District Group, which owns two fashion outlet centres in Mantua and Molfetta.

The loan to Cerberus is secured against six office properties bought from asset manager IdeA Fimit for €143.2m last summer. They are: Via Lancia 55, Turin; Via 9 Jervis, New Ico, Ivrea; Via Pianciani 26, Rome; Via Paracelsus 22-26, Agrate Brianza, Province of Monza and Brianza and Viale Sarca 222, Building 307 and Viale Milanofiori, both in Milan.