Sale of Properties

RNS Number : 7881U

CLS Holdings PLC

19 May 2008

 



Immediate Release: Monday 19 May 2008

CLS HOLDINGS PLC

('CLS')

SALE OF 15 PROPERTIES IN FRANCE

The Board of CLS is pleased to announce that its wholly owned subsidiary Citadel Holdings plc ('Citadel') has completed the sale of 15 properties in France.

The corporate structures owning the 14 properties listed below have been sold to Foncière LFPI, a French property company, for a net consideration after costs and taxes of €44.4 million. The purchaser has also taken over or funded the repayment of the loans secured on these properties amounting to €82.6 million. The effective consideration for the sale after providing for all costs was therefore €127 million

At 31 December 2007, the properties were valued in CLS' accounts at €132.6 million. In addition, deferred tax previously provided in CLS' accounts for these properties of €18.2 million will now be released.

Of the net cash consideration of €44.4 million, €3 million is held in escrow as security for any warranty claims by the purchaser and assuming no claims are made will be released in phases with a long stop date of 2013.

The properties comprising 50,309 sq m (541,526 sq ft) in total have been purchased by companies in the Citadel Group over the past 10 years for an aggregate total in excess of €88 million. The annual net rental income generated by these properties in 2007 was €9.0 million from 58 current tenants, an initial yield of 6.9%.

- Philippe Auguste - 83/85 avenue Philippe Auguste, 75011 Paris

- Rue Goubet - 18/26 rue Goubet, 75009 Paris

- Le Levant - 2 rue du nouveau Bercy, 94220 Charenton Le Pont

- Villa Angelica - 58/60 avenue du Général Leclerc, 92340 Bourg la Reine

- Croissy - 3 allée du 1er Mai, 77420 Croissy Beaubourg

- Colombus - Rond point de l'Europe, 92250 La Garenne Colombes

- Rue Raspail - 23 rue Raspail, 94200 Ivry sur Seine

- Sirius - 11 rue Jean Mazet, 94200 Ivry sur Seine

- Edouard Vaillant - 30 rue Edouard Vaillant, 92300 Levallois

- Van Gogh - 6 rue Van Gogh, 93360 Neuilly Plaisance

- Marcel Pourtout - 5 avenue Marcel Pourtout, 92500 Rueil Malmaison

- Equinox - 1Bis avenue du 8 mai 1945,78280 St Quentin en Yvelines

- Santos Dumont - 23 avenue Louis Bréguet, 78140 Vélizy

- Gauguin - 47 allée des Impressionnistes, 93420 Villepinte

In addition, Citadel's property located at 2 Boulevard Georges Clemenceau in Courbevoie has been sold for €6.7 million to Immovalor, a member of the AGF Allianz Group. This 1,972 sq m (21,227 sq ft) building was purchased by Citadel in 2004 for the equivalent of €5 million. At the time of the sale the building was let to three tenants with no vacancy and generated net rental income of €0.5 million.

CLS intends to hold the cash proceeds of all of these sales for the short to medium term.

Executive Chairman of CLS, Sten Mortstedt, commented:

'We are happy to have sold these assets at an attractive price. The properties have yielded good returns over our period of ownership and these sales strengthen our financial position.'

-ends-

For further information, please contact:

Sten Mortstedt, Executive Chairman

Henry Klotz, Chief Executive Officer

CLS Holdings plc

Tel. [phone]

www.clsholdings.com

Adam Reynolds

Hansard Group

Tel. [phone]

www.hansardgroup.co.uk

 

END

 

 

MSCILFEVERIALIT