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The Singapore Government has built up a 3 per cent stake in British Land, the FTSE 100 property group that has seen its market value dive with the rest of the British property sector.
The holding is worth £135 million ($341 million) based on its current market price, a fraction of what it would have been worth this time a year ago. Since then worries have mounted about the slowing of the British commercial property market.
The company admitted last November that its portfolio had absorbed heavy losses because of the correction in the market. As of yesterday's close it was worth £4.4 billion, about half of what it was last January and less than a third of its £16 billion portfolio.
For the buyer, Singapore's Government-owned fund called GIC, the deal is the latest in a string of buys struck by the country as it seeks to diversify its bulging cash reserves with investments abroad.
Last month, the country's other sovereign wealth fund, Temasek, agreed to bail out Merrill Lynch by buying US$5 billion of shares in the group.
- Independent
