Sirius Real Estate refinances credit facility one year ahead of time

Sirius Real Estate refinanced one of its existing credit facilities a year ahead of time, saying it showed its longest-standing German financiers confidence in its business and the quality of its assets.

The new €170m, seven-year facility agreed with Berlin Hyo AG carried a fixed interest rate of 4.26% and would replace and redeem an existing facility when the latter expired, on 31 October 2023.

"The willingness of Berlin Hyp AG to extend this €170 million facility now for seven years beyond its expiry in October 2023 is indicative of our relationship with our existing and longest standing financiers in Germany and the confidence that they have in our business model and the quality of our assets," said Sirius Real Estate's chief investment officer and interim finance director, Alistair Marks.

"We have a strong balance sheet which is well positioned to provide us with flexibility to react to changing market conditions and opportunities as they arise."

The new credit line extended the total weighted average debt expiry from 3.8 to 5.0 years.

In parallel, when it commenced a year from now, the new facility would raise the company's average weighted cost of debt, from 1.4% to 1.9%.

Sirius, an operator of branded business and industrial parks in Germany and the UK, had €993m of outstanding debt as of 30 September, of which €750m was unsecured and with the new facility accounting for the bulk of the remaining €243m that was mostly comprised of mortgage-backed debt.

The company also had €1.6bn of unencumbered assets and over €138 mof free cash available.

As of 0916 BST, shares of Sirius Real Estate were rising by 1.45% to 69.90p.