ING and Natixis lead financing of Morgan Stanley’s ‘Great Beauty’ Rome portfolio

A consortium of four banks has financed Morgan Stanley’s ‘Great Beauty’ portfolio of three historic office buildings in the centre of Rome with a €150 million loan.

ING Real Estate Finance and Natixis jointly underwrote the facility and were subsequently joined in the deal by BNP Paribas and Italian commercial banking group UBI Banca. The loan has been closed and disbursed to the Sapphire Fund, a recently-formed Italian closed-end fund which is managed by Morgan Stanley.

ING and Natixis underwrote the deal in December 2015. ING’s final take was €60 million, with Natixis taking €50 million, BNP Paribas taking €25 million and UBI taking €15 million. Natixis acted as facility agent.

The Great Beauty portfolio comprises three office buildings totalling 45,000 square metres in Rome’s central business district. The buildings, all built in the Italian Art Nouveau style, are Galleria Sciarra (pictured), Palazzo Verospi and Palazzo Monte di Pietà. The buildings are all fully let.

Morgan Stanley bought the portfolio from Unicredit in a deal which Italian press reports have said was worth more than €200 million.

ING and Natixis have a track record of jointly financing European real estate deals. Last November, the two banks arranged and underwrote a €670 million financing of AEW Europe and China Investment Corporation’s Celsius Portfolio of French and Belgian retail assets.