Catella Property Group has decided to reduce its transaction advisory business in Belgium for the time being. As a consequence of this the current Brussels office will close during 2010. The reason for this decision is profitability challenges in Belgium, combined with the need for restructuring the Brussels office management team.
"After analysing the market potential and the competitive situation the decision has been taken to reduce our current exposure to the Belgium transaction market. Parallel to this decision and as a consequence of the recently announced merger of Scribona and Catella, Catella is at the same time increasing its presence in Luxembourg with more than one hundred persons in the finance sector." says Catella's Group CEO; Johan Ericsson.
"The process will be handled smoothly and with close cooperation with our clients and employees. Catella will ensure that all pending mandates and assignments are successfully taken care of." says Ericsson.
The Brussels advisory business has for the past three years, on average, contributed approximately three percent of the total revenue of the Catella Group, and has been unprofitable on the pre-tax profit level. This decision will have a positive impact on Catella´s rolling twelve months profit.
As announced on May 26th 2010, the listed Swedish company Scribona AB (publ) together with the management of Catella acquired Catella AB. By changing its company name to Catella, the new Scribona-Catella group will create a solid platform for future business development supported by a strong equity position of approximately 90 million. The new Scribona-Catella has operations in 14 countries, with a transaction volume of almost 30 billion during the past three years and assets under management of approximately 4.5 billion.
Source: Catella Financial Advisory AB
