Following CLI’s investor day, Aussie press carries story on CLI acquiring Wingate
In 2014, CapitaLand divested Australand Property Group, that was then snapped up by Frasers Property and has actually since been relabelled Frasers Property Australia. During the question-and-answer discussion, Miguel Ko, chairperson of CLI, claimed that the decision to offer Australand and invest a bit more in China was made just before his time.
At the time, Lim Ming Yan, CapitaLand’s then-president and team chief executive officer, claimed that the divestment came amid “favourable” market conditions. Australand’s share rate also performed strongly in the past couple of months prior to the divestment. “This divestment would certainly enable us to reapportion capital to our core businesses in Singapore and China.”
CapitaLand sold its remaining 39.1% stake in Australand in March 2014 after partially unloading its share in November 2013 to boost trading assets.
He added that the company “did not have a prediction, certainly, about China’s situation these days” and did not intend to talk about his predecessors’ decisions. At the time, China was booming and CapitaLand had a substantial competitive advantage. “That could have been a significant gain or a wrong step. This is not a talk whether my predecessors made a best or bad decision.”
During its investor day on Nov 22, CapitaLand Investment’s (CLI) management said it is wanting to broaden its business in Australia.
CLI also said it is going to invest up to A$ 1 billion ($ 876.7 million) to grow funds under management (FUM) in Australia. In September, CLI finalized its Australian Credit Program (ACP). ACP is CLI’s initial credit fund at A$ 265 million, backed by Asian investors.
It is useful that on Nov 25, the Australian Financial Review ran a story saying that CLI considered to obtain Wingate.
During the course of Nov 22, Lee Chee Koon, group CEO of CLI, stated: “For nonpublic credit we have actually built our very own group and formed a collaboration with teams from Wingate in Australia, stemming and underwriting offers and there’s a whole lot of even more pipeline we can build in Australia and Asia-Pacific.”
The firm recently introduced that it had assigned 2 top hires to newly formed jobs to reinforce its talent bench and spearhead growth in its target market. Angelo Scasserra will be the CEO of CLI Australia, and Rahul Bharara is going to be its chief investment specialist. They are assumed to join the firm in 1H2025.
