EBRD finances new shopping centre in Croatia

The EBRD is supporting the development of the retail infrastructure in Croatia with a €68 million loan to finance the construction of a modern shopping centre in Split, the second largest city in Croatia.

The borrower, Kaufmann i Hoffmann d.o.o., is majority-owned by the Austrian Kaufmann Group, which has a strong track record in building and operating commercial property projects, including City Center One Zagreb, one of the leading retail centres in the Croatian capital.

With the support of the EBRD loan, Kaufmann i Hofmann will build the first modern third-generation shopping centre in Split, which is currently lagging behind other cities in central and eastern Europe in terms of modern shopping space.

City Center One Split will be built using advanced energy saving techniques such as photoelectric solar panels, waste heat recovery, integrated building management system, energy saving lighting and water saving techniques. Due to its low energy intensity, the project will become the first energy passive building financed by the Bank, and the first development in Croatia to be internationally certified under the Building Research Establishment Environmental Assessment Method (BREEAM).

The new development will have total area of 68,000 square meters and 2,600 car parking lots and is expected to save over 4,700 MWh per year in energy consumption, and more than 1,800 tones of CO2 annually comparing to projects lacking energy efficiency investments.

Structured under the Bank’s A/B loan scheme, the EBRD will retain €31 million on its own account, with €37 million being syndicated to BAWAG P.S.K. and Raiffeisenlandesbank Oberösterreich AG.

“We are pleased to support the development of this unique project in the current tight credit market conditions. The involvement of EBRD has secured long term funding in a sector which finds it difficult to attract long term financing from commercial banks. The successful syndication reflects again that a strong sponsor and client relationship is key for banks to finance projects in the commercial property sector”, said Charlotte Ruhe, EBRD Director for Croatia.

Professor Wolfgang Kaufmann, Chairman of Kaufmann Group said “We are grateful to EBRD for their support in this transaction and look forward to working together on future projects. The development of City Center One Split represents a significant step in helping us to realize our expansion plans as a group and further evolving the City Center One brand.”

To date the EBRD has invested over €2.2 billion in the Croatian economy through more than 100 projects in the corporate, financial, infrastructure and energy sectors. The EBRD funds have attracted additional investments worth €3 billion from other sources.