Deutsche Bank, HSBC Close $1B Refi of 28 Liberty Street
By Cathy Cunningham September 20, 2019 10:00 am
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Fosun International has landed a $1.025 billion refinance of its mixed-use property at 28 Liberty Street, sources told Commercial Observer.
Deutsche Bank and HSBC provided the debt. The floating-rate, balance sheet loan has a six-year term and will be syndicated over the next few weeks.
The deal closed on Wednesday.
CBRE’s James Millon, Tom Traynor and Ethan Gottlieb negotiated the financing, sources said. Fosun engaged the CBRE team — including Darcy Stacom and William Shanahan — to explore a variety of ways to raise capital from recapitalization, sale of preferred equity, to financing. Working together, the CBRE team determined that the lowest cost of capital was via a refinancing, one source said. Officials at CBRE declined to comment.
Crain’s New York Business first reported that Fosun was nearing a deal for a roughly $1.1 billion mortgage on the 60-story building — which sits between William and Nassau Streets — last month.
Deutsche Bank and HSBC are no strangers to the property; the two teamed up to provide an $800 million loan on the landmarked 2.1-million-square-foot tower in November 2017.
Stacom and Shanahan also led Chase’s sale of 28 Liberty to Fosun in 2013. The property was built for the bank in 1961 and was previously known as One Chase Manhattan Plaza.
“We thought it was a great deal,” Wei Bo, Fosun’s assistant president and New York executive chief, said of the acquisition in a March interview with CO. “Our view was that the renaissance of Downtown had begun, but it wasn’t yet at its peak. Plus, for a foreign buyer [it was] a great opportunity to acquire such a strategically important building.”
The jewel in the redeveloped tower’s crown is Manhatta, the restaurant from Danny Meyer’s Union Square Hospitality Group on 28 Liberty’s 60th floor (the restaurant has sweeping views over Manhattan and Brooklyn and a 30-day waiting list for reservations). But this year Fosun also announced the completion of the property’s repositioning with a 200,000-square-foot retail destination, Marketplace 28. Movie theater Alamo Drafthouse has leased 40,000 square feet for a 600-seat, 10-screen theater — set to open by year-end — and Legends Hospitality will operate a culinary and live entertainment destination in 35,000 square feet on the ground floor.
In terms of tenancy within the property’s office component, Fosun leased 340,000 square feet to the Office of the New York State Attorney General in January 2017; 130,000 square feet to media company Wolters Kluwer in February 2018; 75,000 square feet to the London Stock Exchange in October 2018; and 53,000 square feet to Booking.com in November 2017.
A spokesperson for Deutsche Bank declined to comment. Officials at HSBC could not immediately be reached for comment. Fosun officials declined to comment.
