Property movement
Property movement Lone Star, the largest single investor in Irish property since the crash, plans to further sell down its existing position in the Irish market this year. It doesn't plan to exit the Irish market or to stop bidding for new property assets and loan portfolios. However, with returns available to investors normalising, the fund will not invest to the same scale in Ireland again, the Sunday Business Post reports.
Sorting office deal
An Post is close to agreeing a deal to sell its sorting office property adjacent to Dublin's Grand Canal Theatre. The 2.3-acre site on Cardiff Lane is likely to be worth more than €45 million, according to the Sunday Times. It reports that Irish and international groups believed to include Clancourt and Brehon Capital have submitted bids for the site. The list of bidders is limited as there is a stipulation that the buyer will have to relocate the existing An Post sorting office to a site within a radius of 1.5 miles from the current Cardiff Lane property.
Bank to offload guarantees
Ulster Bank's internal bad bank is working on plans to sell off hundreds of personal guarantees given by property investors and developers before the financial crisis. According to the Sunday Business Post, the personal guarantees are though to relate to 300 individuals. The paper writes that a similar sale was carried out before by the liquidators of IBRC.
Top salary
The chief executive of pharma research firm Icon has become the highest-paid Irish CEO of a listed company, according to the Sunday Independent. Ciarán Murray last year earned €11.7 million according to the report, a significant rise on his €5.5 million compensation in 2013. Icon’s market capitalisation is $4.4 billion and its shares have risen 34 per cent in the past year.
Advertiser expansion
WPP, the global advertising and marketing group, has formally entered the running to buy a majority stake in Dunnhumby, the Tesco-owned consumer behaviour tracker, reports the Sunday Telegraph. Dunnhumby, which began with the creation of the Clubcard loyalty scheme, is valued at up to £2 billion. According to the paper, the move by WPP would signal an increasing focus on data-driven advertising and marketing. The sale is part of efforts by Tesco chief executive Dave Lewis to repair the supermarket's balance sheet following a collapse in profits and a £263 million accounting scandal that remains under investigation by the UK's Serious Fraud Office.
