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The firm has consistently proven itself in Chinese real estate in recent years, whether underwriting IPOs, advising on M&A, or making acquisitions in its own right. Chris Wright reports.

“This is the least costly path,” US Treasury secretary Hank Paulson told Sunday morning talk-show viewers when he was out selling his $700 billion bail-out package at the end of September. At the time, details of his plans for the US Treasury to buy impaired residential and commercial mortgage assets from banks were scant and concerns about the so-called Troubled Asset Relief Program’s (Tarp) wider impact were great.

The government bailout of mortgage agencies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac has made the case for covered bonds in the US less compelling. After the collapse of the government sponsored entities (GSE), the need for alternative funding methods should have been clear. Instead, with the debt of both entities tightening post-bail-out and the parallel tightening in Federal Home Loan Bank’s (FHLB) debt, covered bond issuance looks comparatively expensive.

KBC Asset Management UK will launch a Japan fund to take advantage of perceived future growth prospects. The seven-year closed-ended fund will invest principally in office, retail and industrial market sectors in Tokyo, Fukuoka, Osaka, and other big Japanese cities.

The future of US mortgage agencies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac is in the hands of politicians. Hours after the $200 billion bailout was announced in early September, Senate Democrats were calling for hearings to analyse the causes of the government-sponsored entities’ (GSE) demise. How the agencies look after the credit crunch abates – if they survive at all – will largely depend on whether the Republicans or Democrats are in charge after the November election.

Property companies remain wary of derivatives

Michael Neal has joined Henderson Global Investors as director of property for its £1.2 billion UK Retail Warehouse Fund. He comes from Goodman Property Investors, where he was responsible for the fund management of Goodman’s two retail park funds: the £550 million Goodman UK Retail Parks Trust and the Two Rivers Trust valued at over £200 million. Neal has spent over 14 years within the retail property industry, primarily working in the retail warehouse sector. He has also held positions at Hammerson, Sainsbury’s and Homebase.

Australia has come out of the credit crunch reasonably well: its biggest banks show no danger of collapse, it has been insulated by its heavy concentration of big resource stocks, and its housing finance industry has been built on more stable foundations than that in the US. One area that has taken a hit, though, is the listed real estate market.

HDG Mansur has added two funds to its roster. The HDGM International Property Fund is modelled after HDG Mansur’s HSBC Amanah Global Properties Income Fund launched in 2002. This closed-end income fund will invest in a global portfolio of properties initially targeted in markets throughout the US and Europe. Denominated in US dollars, the fund’s core investment strategy will be to invest in single- and multi-tenant properties leased to major corporations with stable or improving credit. The fund will be targeted to high-net-worth individuals and institutions and will aim to raise in excess of $200 million.

Concerns have been mounting in recent months that the liquidity schemes offered by the European Central Bank and the Bank of England are being misused by borrowers and are thwarting the recovery of market-based funding, including the MBS market. Announcements from both central banks in September addressed those concerns but their respective timing – one coming before Lehman Brothers’ collapse and AIG’s rescue and the other afterwards – has resulted in a divergence of policy.

Indian property company DLF is expanding from a base of strength in a Delhi suburb to other booming cities. Returns will contract as interest rates and land prices rise but its high-quality product should keep it at the top of the heap. Elliot Wilson reports.

Immoeast’s recent purchase of Constantia Privatbank’s real estate division has set the stage for the next act in the Austrian investment manager’s growth story. Rachel Wolcott reports.