Acquisition of Bravo Inns for £17.9 million

RNS Number : 4164V

NewRiver REIT PLC

03 December 2019

 

NewRiver REIT plc

("NewRiver" or the "Company")

Acquisition of Bravo Inns for £17.9 million

NewRiver is pleased to announce the acquisition of community pub company Bravo Inns Limited ("Bravo Inns") for £17.9 million, representing an EBITDA multiple of 6.8x. The transaction is expected to generate annualised outlet EBITDA of £2.6 million, equating to a yield on cost of 14%, which excludes £0.3 million of synergies expected to be realised through the transfer of Bravo Inns to the Hawthorn Leisure platform. The transaction will be accretive to Underlying Funds From Operations and will further increase dividend cover, which is the Company's key priority.

Bravo Inns owns 44 wet-led community pubs, predominantly located in North West England. The Bravo Inns management have established a high-quality, well-managed and well-invested operator managed portfolio which complements Hawthorn Leisure's existing 660 community pub portfolio.

The acquisition will increase NewRiver's exposure to the highly profitable operator managed pub model. This will provide the Company with opportunities to drive higher returns through accretive capital expenditure and other asset management initiatives, whilst providing the Company with a higher degree of management control and oversight.

Mark Davies, Chief Financial Officer of NewRiver and CEO of Hawthorn Leisure commented: "The UK pub sector has experienced a recent revival in transaction activity and, as an early investor into community pubs, we have been tracking the success of Bravo Inns for some time. The transaction will increase our portfolio weighting in community pubs and demonstrates the value of our Hawthorn Leisure platform in identifying acquisitions that can deliver higher yielding sustainable cashflows with scale driven synergies. A further attraction of this acquisition is the quality of the pub estate and the pub partners. We look forward to welcoming Bravo Inns and its pub partners to Hawthorn Leisure."

For further information

NewRiver REIT plc			[phone]
Allan Lockhart (Chief Executive) Mark Davies (Chief Financial Officer)
Tom Loughran (Head of Investor Relations)

Finsbury				[phone]
Gordon Simpson James Thompson

About NewRiver

NewRiver REIT plc ('NewRiver') is a leading Real Estate Investment Trust specialising in buying, managing, developing and recycling convenience-led, community-focused retail and leisure assets throughout the UK.

Our £1.3 billion portfolio covers 9 million sq ft and comprises 33 community shopping centres, 25 conveniently located retail parks and over 700 community pubs. Having hand-picked our assets since NewRiver was founded in 2009, we have deliberately focused on the fastest growing and most sustainable sub-sectors of the UK retail market, with grocery, convenience stores, value clothing, health & beauty and discounters forming the core of our retail portfolio. This focus, combined with our affordable rents and desirable locations, delivers sustainable and growing returns for our shareholders, while our active approach to asset management and in-built 2.3 million sq ft development pipeline provide further opportunities to extract value from our portfolio.

Hawthorn Leisure is a community pub management company that is owned by NewRiver.

NewRiver has a Premium Listing on the Main Market of the London Stock Exchange (ticker: NRR) and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 and EPRA indices. Visit www.nrr.co.uk for further information.

LEI Number: 2138004GX1VAUMH66L31

 

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