Citi to raise $500m via property sale

Reeling under the US bad loans crisis, Citigroup will raise around $500 million by

RELATED ARTICLES

selling some real estate properties in India, including its headquarters in Bandra Kurla Complex, Mumbai.

The company has appointed Jones Lang LaSalle Meghraj to do a valuation of the headquarters. It is also selling some corporate offices and prime residential properties in Mumbai, Delhi and Chennai. In Mumbai, it has already liquidated about 8 residential properties in the last one year. Recently, it sold a property here to a Bollywood actor for a whopping Rs 30 crore.

Industry officials said the company plans to sell the BKC headquarters and lease it back. When contacted by Financial Chronicle, chairman and country head of Jones Lang LaSalle Meghraj, Anuj Puri, refused to comment.

While Citibank plans to layoff around 2,000 people globally, its India operations are unlikely to face job cuts. Its investment banking division is growing here, with the firm having appointed Nalin Nayyar, formerly with Lehman Brothers, as a managing director in April.

Citigroup India's headcount has risen to over 22,000 from 21,000 a year earlier. It also hired a new head of mergers and acquisitions, Sameer Nath, who was shifted from Citigroup's US operations.

The company has stopped renting flats to employees. “Since the company plans to sell and lease it back, builders or developers may not be interested. People like high net worth individuals or private equity investors may buy this property,” said an official with IL&FS Property Manage-ment Services, the facilities management arm of IL&FS.

Post new comment

E-mail ID will not be published
CAPTCHA
This question is for testing whether you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.
Image CAPTCHA
Copy the characters (respecting upper/lower case) from the image.

EDITORIAL OF THE DAY

  • Scrip’s liquidity, market performance should decide divestment strategy

    It appears that after realising that its disinvestment strategy through follow-on public offers (FPO) has failed in the past three issues, the governm

FC NEWSLETTER

Stay informed on our latest news!

INTERVIEWS

John Mellows

partner and senior advisor to the executive board, Mazars Asia-Pacific

Pravin Kumar Tayal

Former promoter

Girish Paranjpe

joint CEO, Wipro

COLUMNIST

David Leonhardt

The perils of pay less, get more

As a society gets richer, its tax rates tend to ...

Parvez Imam

Life’s lessons: Up, close and personal

Life teaches us lessons every now and then. Som­etimes sweetly, ...

Brandon De Souza

India: A vital cog in Asean golf wheel

Talking about the growth of golf in the Asian region, ...