Aareal Bank AG (OTCPK:AABKF) Q2 2024 Results Conference Call August 8, 2024 5:30 AM ET
Company Participants
Jurgen Junginger – Investor Relations
Christian Ricken – CEO
Marc Hess – CFO
Christof Winkelmann – Chief Market Officer
Conference Call Participants
Shanawaz Bhimji – ABN AMRO
Corinne Cunningham – Autonomous
Domenico Maggio – Jefferies
Jurgen Junginger
Hello, and good morning, everybody. Thank you for joining today’s conference call. Today’s agenda covers our results for the first half of 2024, together with the outlook for the full year. I’m pleased to welcome Dr. Christian Ricken to today’s call. He joined us as CEO on the 1st of August, just 1 week ago. I’m also joined by Marc Hess, our CFO; and by Christof Winkelmann, our Chief Market Officer, who’s participating remotely, as he’s traveling internationally this week. Christian, Marc, and Christof will take you through your presentation, which will be followed by a question-and-answer session.
Now I’m pleased to hand over to Christian. Christian, the floor is yours.
Christian Ricken
Yes. Thank you very much, Jurgen. Good morning, everyone. I’m very pleased having the opportunity talking to all of you on this conference call. So very soon after starting my role, as CEO of Aareal Bank, I see this as the beginning of an ongoing dialogue. And I hope that I’ll be able to meet as many of you as possible in person over the coming weeks and months.
We completed the Management Board handover a few days ago, and I would like to personally and sincerely thank Jochen Klosges for his friendly introduction and for his willingness to remain available over a couple of weeks after my official start date. This will ensure a smooth transition process. My arrival at Aareal Bank has been greeted with friendly curiosity. Over the coming weeks, I will be holding many conversations in-house. I will try to meet as many employees as possible and to absorb a lot of information to gain a complete picture as quickly as possible.
What I can already say is that I have taken over the leadership of a company, which is in a very good shape indeed. This is evident in the excellent figures that we are presenting today. They show that Aareal Bank continues to perform well. The bank is financially robust and has a good position in the markets it covers. It grasps opportunities and actively manages its risks, qualities that we can build upon in the next phase of the bank’s corporate development.
Now if you ask me today what new focal points I will be setting, let me put it this way. Firstly, only after a few days in the office, it’s far too early for me to be able to say where we can improve and where unused potential might be lying dormant. As I said, I need to get a complete picture first. But secondly, today’s figures are clearly showing that the business model is intact. It’s working well. On this basis, the bank has every opportunity to continue performing successfully in the future.
Based on this very positive outlook, I’m taking up my office with confidence, I really look forward to shaping Aareal Bank’s future, maintaining and extending its success story and working with its strong team in the Board and across the whole bank.
I would now like to hand over to our CFO, Marc Hess, who will guide you through our results. Marc, please?
Marc Hess
Yes. Thank you very much, Christian, and good morning to everyone from my side too. Before going into the details of the results, as Christian just announced, let’s first have a look at one of the key highlights of the past quarter, which was obviously the sale of Aareon. I think you know the key facts already, but I would like to summarize them again.
So as you know, and you can see it on Page 2, we announced in June that together with Advent, we had entered into an agreement to sell Aareon. The buyer is a private equity investor TPG and CDPQ, as a minority investor. The transaction is expected to close in the second half of this year, of course, subject to the usual conditions and regulatory approvals. We can say the partnership with TPG will provide Aareon with the access to additional specialized resources and expertise, and it will enable it to continue to drive innovation and future growth.
The financial terms are also already public. It’s based on an enterprise revenue for Aareon of approximately EUR 3.9 billion, and that’s valuing the bank’s equity stake in Aareon at around EUR 2.1 billion. So after the deduction of the transaction-related costs and the book value of Aareal Bank, we will realize a net gain of around EUR 2 billion. The majority of the approximately EUR 150 million transaction-related costs have been booked with signing and are incorporated, therefore, in the results of the second quarter that we are reporting today. The balance will be recognized upon closing of the transaction in the second half.
Another aspect of the transaction is starting with the second quarter 2024 as well as Aareon has to be reported as a discontinued operation. While Aareal’s banking business is reported as a continuing operation. So this is, of course, in line with IFRS or according to IFRS 5. You will also see that in today’s presentation, we have adjusted the comparative P&L figures for 2023, and the first quarter on to that equivalent basis.
So let’s now turn to the figures of the first half ’24 in the second quarter, which I can say we’re very good indeed. And they do, of course, confirm us to or enable us to confirm our operating profit guidance for this year, and this can be seen on Page 4. So we have continued a strong performance in the first half of 2024.
And the highlights for the banking business, so I just explained the continued operations are shown on the left-hand side. We had in the bank, an operating profit of EUR 181 million, which was an increase of 31% against the first half of last year. And as you can see, the bank is now totally on track to achieve its full year target of EUR 250 million to EUR 300 million I just mentioned. Again, our good operating performance has enabled us to offset a still elevated level of risk provisions stemming mainly from the U.S. office portfolio and the efforts we have made to significantly strengthen the bank’s resilience over the recent years continued to pay off, therefore.
Our strong performance also allows us to continue active management of non-performing loans. We will, therefore, plan to — or we, therefore, do reduce the NPLs by another EUR 300 million during the third quarter. I can say now that already a large part of that has been realized in July and early August. And we have, of course, already fully provisioned these EUR 300 million in the second quarter.
Additionally, the capital and liquidity ratios remain very healthy. The bank’s CET1 ratio is at 20.1%, and this is more than 200 basis points more than 5 years ago despite of the strong growth that we have seen both on the asset and on the liability side since then.
So let me now turn briefly to Aareon’s performance in the first half that can be seen on the right-hand side of this slide, Aareon has been able to significantly improve its profitability. The adjusted EBITDA more than doubled to EUR 80 million compared to the first half of ’23. Recurring revenues grew by 43%. As you can also see, Aareon has maintained its strong performance. Most importantly, cooperation between the bank and Aareon will continue after the sale of Aareon. This will be achieved via First Financial, which has been set up, as a joint venture to provide integrated software and payment services.
So both Aareon and Aareal Bank have invested in First Financial, which has been operating since the beginning of the year. And we can say today that the collaboration has already been successful because we have attracted many more new clients for the payment service business in the first half of this year than last year in the first half.
So let’s go to Page 5 and take a closer look through the bank’s first half results. Net interest income is at EUR 530 million, and that’s 11% above the first half of 2023. The net commission income includes those commission payments to First Financial. So through the joint venture, these payments were EUR 20 million in the first half of the year, and they will now accrue regularly. They represent the cost of Aareal of accessing and providing banking services to Aareon’s growing client base and are beneficial for the 2 entities. Excluding the transaction-related costs from the Aareon sale, first half costs remained stable year-on-year. The bank’s cost income ratio was at 34%. So I think, again, we compare very well on an international basis, as an efficient organization.
As expected, risk provisions, including the fair value P&L came in clearly below the previous year’s level. And overall, as I said earlier, the bank achieved an operating profit of EUR 180 million, so 31% up. The second quarter matched 2024’s record first quarter and was over twice last year’s second quarter results. Consolidated net income from discontinued operation, as you can see it here. So Aareon is after the deduction of transaction-related costs, which I already explained, and it therefore, amounted to minus EUR 136 million. Of course, this will change then after closing.
And well, let me now go into the details of the most important P&L lines. Starting with net interest income on Page 6. As I just mentioned, it grew by 11% to EUR 530 million in the first half and EUR 262 million in the second quarter, which is an increase of 6% versus the second quarter of last year. So very strong figures.
Even though as expected, net interest income peaked in the fourth quarter ’23 due to the general trend in interest rates. But nevertheless, we are confident that net interest income for the full year will, however, match the previous year’s level, so around EUR 1 billion, driven by the loan portfolio growth, good margins, good funding spreads and the new business in recent quarters and a strong base of the housing industry deposits, of course.
Let’s turn to Page 7 and have a look at costs. The increase in the second quarter compared to the same quarter of the previous year was mainly due to one-off effects. The first of these was the release of provisions, which had a positive impact in the second quarter last year. Second effect to mention here was the transaction-related costs from the Aareon sales were part of that, which had to be booked in the bank. And as I said, that had to be recognized already in the second quarter. And as I already noted, a very good cost/income ratio of 34%.
Risk provisions, they developed in line with the expected target range for this full year. So as you know, we are expecting roughly EUR 350 million. They totaled EUR 176 million, including fair value P&L of EUR 13 million. And as you can see, there is a decrease of 10% against last year despite of booking a management overlay of EUR 43 million in the first half of this year.
Second quarter risk provisions were EUR 90 million, and that includes EUR 10 million for the P&L. As I mentioned earlier, this also includes risk provisions, which are associated with the planned reduction of approximately EUR 300 million NPLs now in the ongoing third quarter. Once again, I think we can say this all proves that the bank has the strength to actively manage its risk even in a volatile and challenging market environment.
And now I’m going to hand over to Christof Winkelmann, our Chief Market Officer, who will explain to you the developments in the commercial real estate property financing segment.
Christof Winkelmann
Yes. Thank you, Marc. And also from my side, a very good morning or late good morning already, and I’m on Page 9. Considering the low transaction volumes in the commercial property market, we have been acquiring new business on a very selective basis, but as you can see on a very excellent risk and return ratio. Including renewals, the new business volume reached a total of EUR 3.1 billion for the first half of the year and thereof, newly originated loans accounted for roughly EUR 1.8 billion with the company loan-to-value ratios at historical loss of 46% on average.
And what does that mean for us? Well, it shows that the equity portion contributed by clients relative to the current market value of finance properties is high at present, providing quite a good security buffer for us, as a bank. At the same time, as you can see, the average gross margin remained very strong, reaching 267 basis points for the first half of the year. This is a very good figure and in line with our focus on new business that has, as I’ve mentioned, excellent risk and return parameters.
There have been no major changes, as you can see the distribution of the new business, our activities remains focused on Europe and primarily on the financing of office buildings and hotels. During the first half of the year, new business relating to offices was exclusively in Europe with very conservative average loan-to-value ratio of just about 49%. Besides that, our partner banks remain very happy to participate and accept these loans, we will syndicate to them, which also shows that they share our risk assessment. We have syndicated over EUR 500 million in office financings in Europe alone in the first half of this year.
Offices and hotels each made up about 1/3 of our new business with the remainder spread across our other businesses such as the retail, logistics, student housing and the alternative living segment, which means that we remain, as we always have broadly diversified.
Reporting the green transformation of commercial properties is another key focus, as you know, of our activities. We have extended just under EUR 1 billion in new green financings under our green lending framework during the first half of the year. And on top of this, we were able to reclassify loans worth around EUR 0.5 billion to green. So this means, for instance, we reclassified them because our clients have achieved the appropriate certifications and submitted the relevant evidence.
The next slide, Slide 10, shows our existing portfolio, which had a portfolio volume of EUR 32.6 billion on the reporting date. The competition, as I’ve mentioned, hasn’t changed much either during the first half of the year compared to the end of 2023. As shown, it continues to be broadly diversified across regions and property types with a focus on properties in major metropolitan areas. Furthermore, as you know, we don’t really offer financing to property developers and have provided only minor financing volumes in Germany. And these volumes in Germany are mostly cross-border portfolio financings, which are across the Netherlands.
As pointed out in connection with the new business, we also finance properties that require renovations to improve their energy efficiency. And our green loan portfolio now just — amounts to just under EUR 6 billion. Remind you, we started this program just about 2 years ago, and the total lending volume classified through green assets has meanwhile risen to EUR 9.9 billion, which will be an equivalent of roughly 31% of our entire commercial property financing portfolio. With the emphasis we are putting on this area, our green portfolio is expected to grow further also within this year. The path to green transformation always begins with the first step, and I believe that we’ve taken several meters and steps already in this regard.
On Page 11, you will see the — that the overall asset quality has improved. The loan-to-value ratios are averaging an excellent 56% and have thus remained stable compared to the end of 2023. And if you now take a look at the bottom left of the slide, you will see the yield on debt, and it has continuously improved over the recent years, reaching a new high of 10.1%. In fact, it has now significantly exceeded pre-pandemic levels.
On Slide 12, we’ll focus a bit more on our U.S. office portfolio. The portfolio has been reduced by 5% during the first half of the year to now stand below EUR 3 billion. We have not added any new office financings in the U.S. in 2024. Around 50% of the portfolio is in New York and the rest is largely spread throughout major U.S. cities. We have concentrated, as we always do on high-quality Class A properties in A markets.
We continue to monitor the portfolio closely and interact early and most of all regularly with our borrowers. As a result, 81% of the portfolio has a layered LTV of less than 60% and only 3% of the portfolio has an LTV of over 80%, with no loans having an LTV over 100%. And although, still it’s early days, there are first signs that buyers may be coming back into the market attracted by the expectations of lower interest rates and reset asset values.
On Slide 13, as mentioned at our annual press conference back in March, we look into the question of whether the current situation for the U.S. office property market was going to spread to Europe. I can clearly say it hasn’t. Office markets in the U.S. and Europe are hardly comparable because there are a number of significant structural differences between the 2 continents. They include, for example, a different interest rate environment, a lower vacancy rate and a much longer investment horizon on average by equity investors into real estate in Europe.
As you can see in the chart in the bottom left, 95% of our European office property financing portfolio has an LTV of below 60%. Mathematically, this provides a very significant buffer in the event of any further market deterioration. We have not incurred any new non-performing loans in the European office property segment since 2022. I think this very much speaks for what I just said in the quality of our portfolio — the office portfolio in Europe. And I believe it’s very clear we have a very clear investment focus. We finance offices in top locations.
For example, in France, only in and around Paris, and I mean, city center, I’m not talking about Tour de France. And we focus on the transformation of buildings, especially also in Paris with the state-of-the-art offices with excellent energy efficiency characteristics. Such properties already account for a good third of all of our property financings in France. And as far as U.K. is concerned, we are concentrating on Central London. [indiscernible] has not and will not be part of our lending.
Now on Page 14, we will see our portfolio of non-performing loans. We’ve totaled around EUR 1.4 billion at the end of June, just under EUR 200 million less than at the end of 2023, but up by around EUR 300 million compared to the end of this year’s first quarter. Now the question is why does the volume fluctuate so much? Well, one and cannot be precisely managed for specific reporting date. So what’s important to us is the trend, and this is moving into the right direction.
We are making very good progress in reducing our NPLs actively, managing our portfolio not passively. As I said, we’ve already planned for EUR 300 million reduction of the existing NPLs in the third quarter and that Marc alluding to that, some of these have already happened. And this is covered by the risk provisioning already recognized in the second quarter, which I think speaks for itself.
We do see very few public exposures outside the U.S. office property financing portfolio, as the numbers show. In other words, while the situation in the U.S. office property market remains challenging, as we had already alluded to at the beginning of the year, we do not see similar issues in the other markets or regions of our portfolio. Ultimately, it is reflected in our NPE ratio, which according to the EBA definition, was at 3.3% at the end of June and that’s slightly below the level from year end 2023.
And with this, I’d like to hand it back to Marc.
Marc Hess
Yes. Thank you very much, Christof. So let’s now turn to our second banking segment, BDS. Here, we have a volume of EUR 13.8 billion in deposits from the housing industry and that’s an absolute pleasing high level, which continues to clearly exceed our plans, which were at around EUR 13 billion.
First, net interest income has benefited not only from the normalized interest rate environment, but also for those — from those volumes. It was up 22%, as you can see it here in the first 6 months and reached EUR 135 million.
The net commission income also increased, at least on an operating basis, as you can see it here. However, as I already explained it initially, the net figure is diluted by the commission payments to the First Financial joint venture.
And that already brings us to funding on the next page, which is Page 17. We know, we have invested a lot to become more diversified here, and I think this can be seen now as a result. We benefit from a stable deposit base that provides us with a lot of independence from the volatile capital markets. In addition to the deposits from the housing industry, which I just mentioned, we also have retail term deposits at our disposal, in particular platform such as Raisin, where we have continuously expanded the business in the recent quarter.
Now we can say that the volume we have generated, and which has reached now EUR 3.5 billion, it’s basically our target volume. So for us, it’s more important now to also diversify this aspect of our funding, and this is where we have already made good progress now more than 97% of our retail term deposits have an original maturity of more than 2 years. And the depositors, which initially only came from Germany have been diversified as well. So we have added the access to the Austrian and the Dutch and the Irish market in the first half of this year. And we’re also confident that we can add France in the second half.
Our capital markets activities have been very successful during the first half of June. For instance, we have issued a first green senior non-preferred benchmark in June, and that was several times oversubscribed. The same applies for our Pfandbrief that we placed in July, and this as well has attracted a lot of interest and also was with a high oversubscription.
Looking ahead, in the second half, we would be open to the idea of bringing forward a Tier 2 benchmark, which was originally planned in 2025, of course, only if market conditions are right. We also do plan for a further benchmark of Euro-Pfandbrief in the second half. So this can certainly be expected by you. And we are happy that the solid nature of our funding position was affirmed by Moody’s in June. Moody’s confirmed our long-term issuer rating and changed the outlook from negative to stable. So let me also mention the liquidity ratios briefly. The NSFR very solid at 120%. Same goes for the LCR at 239%.
Next slide, focus on Pfandbrief funding. Pfandbrief, as you know, remain the cornerstone of our capital markets funding. The cover pool stands at EUR 17.1 billion and is diversified across 19 countries and also across asset classes. The pool represents a first-class mortgage loans and has an average LTV of 34.5%. So very solid Tier 2. The AAA rating that we have from Moody’s relies on an overcollateralization of 15.5% on a PV basis, and we are very much ahead of that with 22.8%.
Turning now to capital, Page 19. Our ratios continue to be very strong here indeed. We were able to increase the CET1 ratio of the bank to 20.1% at the end of June, that is B4 phase-in. If you’re looking already at a fully phased ratio, which will only become effective in 2030, then we would already been at 15.0%, so also a very strong level.
I should also mention that we are now reporting the capital ratios, excluding the discontinued operations, so only for the bank and not including Aareon. Leverage ratio at 6.9%. And I think also this, as you can see, obvious, very much ahead of the regulatory requirement.
So let’s go to the outlook. We can confirm our full year guidance for the bank. As you see it here, we anticipated an operating profit of EUR 250 million to EUR 300 million, and given the good performance in the first half, I think that’s an achievable range for the year. In addition, we expect now a net gain of around EUR 2 billion from the sale of Aareon. So together with the results generated by the bank, this translates then into a consolidated net income, so after tax of approximately EUR 2.2 billion for the year. So a very positive outlook.
And with that, I would like to hand back over to Christian for his concluding remarks.
Christian Ricken
Yes. Thank you, Marc. Let me finish by summarizing the most important points. Firstly, I’m taking over a very solid bank, which can generate good results even without its Aareon software subsidiary.
Secondly, nevertheless, Aareon and Aareal Bank will remain closely linked through their First Financial joint venture. Together they will continue to provide services to their clients.
And thirdly, the key financial performance indicators of Aareal Bank are pointing into the right direction. But you cannot shape the future by resting on your laurels. Right now, our priority is to close the sale of Aareon smoothly, while continuing to actively manage our loan portfolio. We plan to reduce NPLs by EUR 300 million during the next quarter. At the same time, our goal is to continue growing, but only at appropriate risk and return profiles.
This gives me the opportunity to express my sincere thanks to Marc, who has presented the bank’s figures for the last time today. I found a transparent and solid set of figures and a very well-organized finance organization with great reporting and planning processes and excellent staff. This is a very good basis for his successor, who will start on the 1st of October. My heartfelt thanks to Marc for ensuring an orderly transition.
Andy Halford, new CFO is a very seasoned and vastly experienced finance expert, who has managed finance and treasury operations through various market cycles. At Standard Chartered, he has contributed significantly to the bank’s return to profitable growth. Together with Nina Babic and Christof Winkelmann, he will complete the formidable team with whom I’m very much looking forward to shaping the future of Aareal Bank. I will present my conclusions on the next steps for IR at the latest with the results for the fourth quarter of 2024.
And now Marc, Christof and I look forward to your questions. Thank you.
Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
[Operator Instructions] And the first question comes from Domenico Maggio from Jefferies.
Domenico Maggio
I have just 2 questions, please. I assume some of the proceeds from the disposal of Aareon will be distributed to our shareholders. Can you disclose how much will be paid out? If not, maybe you can give us a range? Also, I assume the regulator will be involved in discussion around this. So do you have a feeling on what payout that will allow?
And the second question, now I appreciate how the NPL stock can be volatile, and you have — you can take management action, as you indicated today. But can you provide more color on the Q-on-Q increase in NPL, I think that was EUR 292 million. And also, the one, I mean, it’s clearly driven by the increase in NPL in offices of EUR 160 million. Yes, if you can provide any color there on the background trend, what you’re seeing? I mean, it’s clearly not surprising, but any color is appreciated?
Marc Hess
Yes. Domenico, it’s Marc speaking. Thank you for your questions. I think I’ll take the first one; and Christof will take the second one. So on the gain on sale of Aareon, I said, it’s not yet in our books. So it still takes some time. What are our plan here? Well, obviously, and you have seen a hint already in the squeeze-out documents that were published. The ambition is to pay out the largest part of that.
And I think if you’re looking at our capital ratio, which do not include yet this gain on sale, you can see they are very strong. Of course, this is always subject to discussions with the supervisor, so here with the ECB in particular. These discussions are typically not commented in public. And as I said, we are not yet there. So we have not yet received those gain on sales. So I think I would like to leave it with what I just commented, the ambition is to pay out the largest part, and this is, of course, subject to the discussions with the ECB.
Christof Winkelmann
Thank you. And Domenico, I’ll take the second question, and please ask if I’m not answering it in the best possible way at this point. The — I think we’ve seen some bottoming out in the U.S. and whether we’re already on the way up or not, I think is a large discussion. But with a potential interest rate decrease, I think the likelihood of that improving rather than getting worse is probably something that I would tend to lean to more than the other side.
And as I said, it’s very difficult to steer to a date. So if I, for example, do new business, and it happens to close on the 31st of March, then that will be booked in the first quarter, if it happens on the 1st of April is booked in the second quarter. And as Marc has already hinted to the EUR 300 million decrease for the third quarter is not — we’re not saying this is what we’re going to do, but these are the ones that we have already provisioned for in Q2, and that will happen and some of them have already happened.
So I think a good number to look at is the end of 2023 and looking at the end of June — at the end of the second quarter this year, to decrease and with another EUR 300 million already earmarked to leave the portfolio, I think the trend is clear. We’re not — we’ll not say that there are not one or other new NPL coming or the other way around or there will be one other more NPL leaving our balance sheet. But I think remembering it on a case-by-case basis and the good chance is that we’re not seeing anything similar to the U.S. office trends in the rest of the portfolio, which I think is something to stand for, especially when considering not a single NPL in the office segment in Europe since 2022, which should give you a good guidance of where we should be heading over the next 1 or 2 quarters.
Operator
And the next question comes from Corinne Cunningham from Autonomous.
Corinne Beverley
My first question has already been answered on Aareon. Next one, I wanted to ask about the First Financial joint venture. Can you explain exactly what it does and how the P&L is impacted more of a forward-looking basis, please?
Christof Winkelmann
Hi, Corinne, happy to do so. Well, we have formed a joint venture called First Financial with Aareon. This has been set up last year in autumn and went live 1st of January. What we have bundled here is the payment software, which we have developed in the bank so far and will now be developed jointly. So that is a part, let’s say, of the software offering that is distributed with the ERP software of Aareon. And therefore, of course, a very important feature for us, as a bank to deliver our payment services to the clients of Aareon.
Around that, we have a bundle of contracts, including, of course, an incentivization for Aareon to, first of all, develop the software going forward and to sell it to the clients. And as I said, this incentivization is a new feature, and this has already turned out to be very positive. Just to give you a figure here, in the first half of last year, we had 11 new payment logos or clients generated via Aareon. This year, in the first half, it was 21. So it more than doubled. And therefore, we are quite confident that with this joint venture, the cooperation of Aareon and Aareal Bank in the future will have a very strong foundation to develop it forward, maybe even on a European level, as we already outlined. I hope that has answered your question.
Corinne Beverley
And kind of except the — so the income will just be your share, is it 50-50? And then, the commission payments that you’re showing, how does that relate to what you’ve just explained?
Christian Ricken
Yes. The share is 75% for Aareon and 25% for the bank. Of course, we have some minority protection rights here. And we are paying, let’s say, we are paying in the top line, as you can see, around EUR 20 million in the first half, so around EUR 40 million for the full year. Of course, this is pre-minority. So in the minority line, we get 25% of that quarter back.
Operator
[Operator Instructions] And the next question comes from Shanawaz Bhimji from ABN AMRO.
Shanawaz Bhimji
Hi, everyone. And first of all, obviously — hello, can you hear me?
Christian Ricken
Yes, we can hear you very well.
Shanawaz Bhimji
Great. Yes. Well, first and foremost, well, good luck to the old management team. Thank you very much for all your efforts so far. And also, good luck to the new management team with the bank, as it stands. I have a question because you just mentioned about a potential Tier 2 transaction you guys wanted or are contemplating at the moment. What’s the reason behind this? Because if I look at your capital levels, and let’s also to exclude the proceeds from the gain from the Aareon transactions, they’re still very at a satisfactory level. So why we’re seeing a Tier 2 at the moment?
Christian Ricken
Yes. No, Shanawaz, thank you very much for your question. There are several levels. I would like to answer. First is we have seen very strong demand for our senior non-preferred issuance. So I think there has been built up a very good momentum for those kinds of, let’s say, capital related issuances from Aareal. That’s one thing. And this is why we say, well, of course, market conditions have to be right. And we are not under pressure, as I mentioned. This is planned for 2025. But if we can keep that momentum, I think it would be a good moment to issue a Tier 2
Secondly, so more fundamental to your question, well, we are seeing some of our Tier 2 issuances maturing. So it’s a replacement character on the one hand. And last but not least, it’s also preparing for B4]. As you can see, we put a very strong emphasis already to be prepared for B4 having a very strong CET1 ratio of 15.0% in the fully loaded world. And we also have to manage all the other capital stacks. Well, there is still some time to go. This is why we don’t have a necessity to do it this year. But again, if we would be well received by the market, I think it would be a good timing point.
Shanawaz Bhimji
Okay. Got you. Good luck with that. Then a follow-up on the new business. Can you perhaps share like what kind of debt yields you’re currently underwriting on, let’s say, new office deals and hotel deals? And what kind of occupancy levels you are seeing there?
Christof Winkelmann
Sure. It’s very difficult to give you a debt yield across the board, and there’s no one size fits all because different asset classes have different going-in yields per se and cap rates, as you may appreciate. And also, if you do a renovation versus an existing asset that is fully functioning, it’s also different. What I can say is, I think what we’re looking for is debt service capability, serviceability in terms of ICRs and DCRs that have sufficient headroom to weather any and all storms coming and going forward, and things are hedged.
So when we look into the arrangement and agreements, we’re making sure that DCRs and ICR levels are at a very good momentum. And I think this is what we’ve been very successful of doing currently, and that is not accounting for any interest rate decreases, as we move along. So we are basing this on the current environment that needs to be serviceable with a good cushion. I think that’s how I would explain it.
Shanawaz Bhimji
That makes sense. So what kind of DCR level would you then be talking about 2 or 1.5?
Christof Winkelmann
It again depends on the asset class, whether you’re going into renovation, where a building might be empty for renovation purposes or fully functioning. So you will have — so you will have a coverage that, again, as I said, is adequate to cater for these cases, both on an existing basis and on refurbishment.
Operator
So it seems this was the last question. I would now like to turn the conference back over to Marc Hess for any closing remarks.
Marc Hess
Yes. Thank you very much. As it has just been said by Christian, this has been my last results call, as the CFO of Aareal. So I would like to thank you all for the support of the last — over the last couple of years. I hope to see you, again, maybe in a different setting, and I would like to say a special thanks to my team. It was really a pleasure working with you. Thank you very much.
Operator
Ladies and gentlemen, the conference has now concluded, and you may disconnect. Thank you for joining, and have a pleasant day. Goodbye.
Read the full article here