The Supervisory Board of CORESTATE Capital Holding S.A. (CORESTATE), a leading European real estate investment manager, today appointed Lars Schnidrig its new Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and Chairman of the Management Board for four years. The 46-year-old former Chief Financial Officer has held the functions of CEO and Chairman of the Management Board on an interim basis since 31 December 2018. At the same time, the management contract of co-founder Thomas Landschreiber as Chief Investment Officer was also extended for another three years.
Frankfurt, 21 March 2019 – The Supervisory Board of CORESTATE Capital Holding S.A. (CORESTATE), a leading European real estate investment manager, today appointed Lars Schnidrig its new Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and Chairman of the Management Board for four years. The 46-year-old former Chief Financial Officer has held the functions of CEO and Chairman of the Management Board on an interim basis since 31 December 2018. At the same time, the management contract of co-founder Thomas Landschreiber as Chief Investment Officer was also extended for another three years.
“We are very pleased to have Lars Schnidrig, a high-profile candidate, serve as our CEO and thus ensure continuity in the management of the Group. As CFO of CORESTATE since July 2017, he has provided significant entrepreneurial impetus, put the Group on a very solid financial footing and accompanied the strategic transformation process with a high level of personal commitment. Together with co-founder Thomas Landschreiber, who has been a successful Chief Investment Officer for many years, he will consistently develop the company further. Thus, the management of CORESTATE Holding is sustainably oriented,” commented Micha Blattmann, Chairman of the Supervisory Board.
“CORESTATE is excellently positioned as a successful investment platform for our clients. I will now do everything in my power to further implement our ambitious growth targets. We will achieve this with innovative products, by developing new Groups of investors and by pursuing an unrestricted customer focus. As in the past, we will also exploit opportunities for value-creating inorganic growth and focus on strategic partnerships. Together with Thomas Landschreiber, I intend to develop CORESTATE into the most attractive platform for real estate investments in Europe,” Chairman of the Management Board Lars Schnidrig added.
CORESTATE’s Management Board consists of Lars Schnidrig as CEO and Thomas Landschreiber as CIO. From now on, Lars Schnidrig will be responsible for the strategic orientation of the company as well as the central areas M&A, Finance, Investor Relations, Communication, Legal Affairs and Human Resources. Thomas Landschreiber will continue to be responsible for the Group’s operative business with a focus on Equity Raising and Investment Management. An experienced management team will support the Management Board on managing the Group.
Expansion of the Supervisory Board
The company is also expanding its Supervisory Board by two seats to a total of five members. The first candidate, Jonathan Lurie, has already been selected. He has more than 20 years of experience in the real estate industry with leading companies in all major European regions and asset classes. Jonathan Lurie is currently Senior Advisor, Real Estate, at McKinsey & Company and Managing Partner at Realty Corporation. Before that, he worked as Managing Director, Real Estate Asset Management at Blackstone, as Head of Real Estate Investment Management Europe at Goldman Sachs and as Director at Tishman Speyer in London and New York.
Record year 2018
CORESTATE also presented its financial figures for 2018 today. The Management Board and Supervisory Board will propose to the Annual Annual General Meeting a dividend of Euro 2.50 per share for the past fiscal year (2018: Euro 2.00). The dividend thus confirms the company’s long-term distribution policy, which provides for shareholders to participate in around half of the company’s earnings per share as dividend.
For 2018 as a whole, CORESTATE generated aggregated revenues of Euro 292 million (+50% compared to 2017), adjusted EBITDA of Euro 184 million (+50%) and adjusted net income of Euro 135 million (+45%). Lars Schnidrig: “2018 was truly a record year for both the Group and its subsidiaries. In the end, we even exceeded the forecast we had raised in November. Earnings per share rose by around 50%, at the same time we reduced our financial leverage by half.”
The CORESTATE subsidiary Helvetic Financial Services (HFS), the leading provider of mezzanine capital for real estate developments, increased its fund volume to Euro 1.23 billion in the past fiscal year, its best fiscal year to date. “HFS’s outstanding market positioning forms an excellent starting point for broadening its product range and establishing a diversified private debt platform with attractive organic growth potential. In this context, I am particularly pleased that HFS founder Norbert Ketterer has extended his mandate as Chairman of the Management Board for another two years and that we will continue to have one of the central driving forces and pioneers for financing solutions and real estate development on board in the coming years,” said Lars Schnidrig.
The financial outlook for 2019 is confirmed. CORESTATE expects aggregated revenues of between Euro 285 million and Euro 295 million, EBITDA of between Euro 165 million and Euro 175 million and adjusted net income of between Euro 130 million and Euro 140 million. The core business of the Group, Real Estate Investment Management, is expected to grow by more than 30% and thus increase the quality and sustainability of the revenue structure in the current fiscal year. “In 2018, we successfully completed the integration of our major acquisitions and delivered the best result in our company’s history. The associated Group-wide transformation has taken CORESTATE to a new, more powerful level. We are thus ideally equipped to meet the challenges of the coming years – first and foremost to reach our ambitious operating targets,” concluded Thomas Landschreiber.
About CORESTATE Capital
CORESTATE is an investment manager and co-investor with around € 28 billion in assets under management. The company sees itself as a manager for the entire length of the real estate value chain. Thanks to its fully integrated real estate platform, it is able to offer investors a wide range of services, especially the opportunity to invest in large-scale societal trends such as urbanisation, demographic shifts or sustainability – trends that will continue to have a decisive influence on the living and working environment in the long term. The consistent focus on asset classes that will be successful in the long run constitutes a central cornerstone of the company strategy. At CORESTATE, all concepts are supported with ESG expertise that is unique to the industry. With some 800 experts, CORESTATE offers clients and investors a full range of services and consultation from a single source, from project financing and real estate management to sales. CORESTATE is listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange (SDAX) and operates as a respected business partner for institutional and semi-institutional investors as well as high-net-worth private investors in 13 countries across Europe, with offices in Frankfurt, Vienna, Zurich, Paris, Madrid and London.
Forward-looking statements
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