NEW YORK CITY–Following a spate of mergers and acquisitions in recent days comes yet another deal: Blackstone Real Estate Partners VIII has agreed to acquire Gramercy Property Trust for $27.50 per share in an all-cash transaction valued at $7.6 billion.
The transaction represents a premium of 15% over the closing stock price on May 4, and a 23% premium over the 30-day volume-weighted average share price. It has been unanimously approved by Gramercy's Board of Trustees.
Under the deal, which is scheduled to close in the second half of 2018, Gramercy shareholders will receive the previously announced Q2 dividend of $0.375 per share on July 16, 2018. If the transaction is completed after October 15, Gramercy shareholders will receive a per diem amount of $0.004 per share for each day until the closing date.
Gramercy CEO Gordon DuGan says the deal will maximize shareholder value. “We believe this validates the quality of the portfolio and platform that we have built,” he says in a prepared statement.
Gramercy Property Trust specializes in acquiring industrial commercial real estate leased in the United States and Europe. This deal follows by days another blockbuster industrial transaction, which is Prologis' proposed acquisition of rival industrial REIT DCT Industrial Trust for $8.4 billion in stock. There have been a spate of such deals in recent weeks: Health care REIT Welltower has entered into a definite agreement to acquire Quality Care Properties in an all-cash transaction for approximately $1.95 billion, and mortgage REIT Annaly Capital Management is to acquire MTGE Investment Corp. in a cash-and stock transaction valued at $900 million, among other deals.
Morgan Stanley is acting as exclusive financial advisor to Gramercy and Eastdil Secured is its real estate consultant. Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz is Gramercy's legal advisor. Citigroup Global Markets and BofA Merrill Lynch are acting as Blackstone's financial advisors and Simpson Thacher & Bartlett is acting as legal advisor to Blackstone.
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Erika Morphy
Erika Morphy has been writing about commercial real estate at GlobeSt.com for more than ten years, covering the capital markets, the Mid-Atlantic region and national topics. She's a nerd so favorite examples of the former include accounting standards, Basel III and what Congress is brewing.
