Meet The Two Guys With $25B To Spend On Real Estate In The U.S. And Europe

Norges Bank Investment Management, the body which manages Norway’s $988B sovereign wealth fund, has just appointed real estate chief investment officers for the U.S. and Europe. They have a mission to spend $25B in the two regions combined.

Per Løken will head investments in the U.S., while Romain Veber will lead European investments. Both joined Norges in 2011, with Løken having previously focused on the U.K. and Weber on Paris.

Norges has around 2.5% of its assets in real estate, or around $25B, and has a mandate to double that to 5% at a pace of around $5B a year. This will be split evenly between Europe and the U.S., Norges said, and it is mainly a buyer of prime offices and high street retail.

Big deals in the U.S. include the purchase of a 45% stake in a portfolio of four Boston and New York office buildings valued at $5.5B from Boston Properties.

In Europe its biggest single deal came last year when it bought a €1B office and retail building on Place Vendôme in Paris.

It has also been one of the few non-Asian institutional investors that has continued investing in London post-Brexit.

“We will continue to invest in a number of — say, 10-plus — major global cities, and London is definitely one of those,” Norges executive board chairman Øystein Olsen said at the time of its annual results in March.

Continue reading this story with a free account

Log in or register
Sign up for more articles like this
Subscribe to Bisnow's London Newsletters
Related Stories

Why Hines Is Restarting Its Development Engine

Invesco Cuts Fees, Adds Incentives To Quell Fund Redemption Requests

NYC Office Investor Warns It Could Go Under As Defaults Pile Up

Pinewood Studios Pays Owners £100M Dividend And Completes £300M Refinancing

Deutsche Bank Takes 5 Floors At Oaktree And Quadrant's Canary Wharf Scheme

Large Commercial Real Estate Sales Up 30% Despite Economic Headwinds

Evergrande Founder Sentenced To Life, 56 Others Sent To Prison In China

Coconut Grove Office Flipped For $15M Gain After One Year

Ashley's Frasers Sets £20B Real Estate Acquisition Target

Oxford Properties Pays $435M For Boston Office Tower, Eyes More Deals

Billionaire Buys Into BTR With £150M Deal

Avison Young Plans Second Major Recapitalization Since 2024