Liberty Shareholders Approve $12.6B Prologis Acquisition
The deal is expected to close on or around Feb. 4.
WAYNE, PA—Liberty Property Trust shareholders approved the previously-announced $12.6 billion acquisition by Prologis at a special meeting held this week.
When the transaction closes, which is expected to be on or around Feb. 4, Liberty shareholders will receive 0.675 shares of Prologis common stock for each Liberty common share they own.
The deal is reflective of the high demand for industrial warehouses, particularly those that are located in last mile delivery locations—the transaction, for example, will deepen San Francisco-based Prologis’ presence in target markets such as Lehigh Valley, Chicago, Houston, Central PA, New Jersey and Southern California.
The assets trading include a 107 million square foot logistics operating portfolio, 87% of which overlaps with key markets; 5.1 million square feet of logistics development in progress; 1,684 acres of land for future logistics development with build-out potential of 19.7 million square feet and 4.9 million-square-foot office operating and development portfolio.
As part of the deal, Prologis will sell off $3.5 billion of assets. This includes $2.8 billion in non-strategic logistics properties and $700 million of office properties.
Prologis has been aggressively acquiring logistics and warehouse assets to keep on top of the market. Besides the Liberty deal, it just closed on its acquisition of Industrial Property Trust’s real estate assets for $4 billion in cash, including the assumption and repayment of debt.
In November of last year, the REIT and Norges Bank Investment Management struck a deal to acquire a 19 million square feet logistics real estate portfolio in a $1.99 billion deal.