Buddle Findlay is pleased to have acted as New Zealand counsel to Bank of New Zealand and Commonwealth Bank of Australia, in respect of New Zealand law syndicated facilities made available to a GIC-Brookfield consortium (Consortium), to fund the acquisition by the Consortium of the New Zealand operations of ASX listed real estate investment trust National Storage REIT (NSR). This was part of the broader A$6.7b 'take-private' acquisition by the Consortium (by way of scheme of arrangement) of all NSR operations in Australia and New Zealand.
The Buddle Findlay team was led Paul Farrugia and Miriam Andrews working with senior associate Matthew Triggs and solicitors Maya de Souza-Jones and Ben Allan. Gilbert & Tobin (John Schembri and Spiro Papdolias) advised the finance parties on all Australian law aspects of the transaction.
GIC is a leading global investment firm and Brookfield Asset Management is a global alternative asset manager.
NSR is Australasia's largest owner and operator of self-storage facilities. NSR’s portfolio comprises more than 300 self-storage centres and developments across Australia and New Zealand, serving 100,000 residential and commercial customers. The acquisition of NSR by the Consortium is the largest ever privatisation of an ASX-listed real estate investment trust.
