Pensionskasse Basel-Stadt and Baloise form partnership Mittwoch, 16. Dezember 2020 - 07:00

Media information

Basel, 16 December 2020. As part of its Simply Safe strategy, Baloise aims to achieve a significant increase in the volume of external customer assets managed by Baloise Asset Management. The new partnership with Pensionskasse Basel-Stadt will help to realise this ambition. Acting as a transaction manager, Baloise advised the pension fund regarding the purchase of seven properties in prime locations in Geneva. Going forward, Baloise’s remit will no longer be limited to asset management but will also include property management responsibility on behalf of Pensionskasse Basel-Stadt for these seven properties.

In times of low interest rates, investment conditions are challenging for pension fund assets. By buying these attractive properties, Pensionskasse Basel-Stadt has found a profitable and sustainable investment opportunity for its policyholders’ assets. Baloise – itself one of the largest institutional real estate portfolio holders in western Switzerland – advised the pension fund during the contract negotiations. Under the new partnership between the two companies, Baloise will continue to provide support as an asset and property manager for these properties.

All seven properties are located in Geneva and are currently fully let. The majority of the portfolio consists of residential real estate located on the Rive Gauche, one of Geneva’s prime locations. The total value of the transaction amounts to more than half a billion Swiss francs.

“We are delighted that we were able to seal the deal for the purchase of this extraordinary portfolio of properties in the heart of Geneva for the benefit of our policyholders, not least because this large transaction comprises rare residential property investments in highly sought-after and popular parts of the city. These fully let buildings are part of our sustainable long-term development strategy and constitute our first direct investment in Geneva. The transaction will raise our volume of investments in domestic real estate assets to more than CHF 3 billion and will therefore strengthen the proportion of stable investments that deliver regular returns,” says Max-Eric Laubscher, Head of Asset Management at Pensionskasse Basel-Stadt.

Munzur Halis, Head of Real Estate Transactions at Baloise Asset Management, adds: “This partnership emphasises our ability to structure and complete high-quality acquisitions in a competitive environment on behalf of our customers. As a result of the cooperation, we are gaining a key customer for our product portfolio, which is focused on third-party mandates. We look forward to working with Pensionskasse Basel-Stadt for many years to come.”

Further information

• Media information at www.baloise.com
• Baloise Asset Management: www.baloise-asset-management.com
• Pensionskasse Basel-Stadt (PKBS): www.pkbs.ch

Contacts

Baloise Group, Aeschengraben 21, 4002 Basel, Switzerland

Website: www.baloise.com

Email: media.relations@baloise.com / investor.relations@baloise.com

Media Relations: Tel: +41 (0)58 285 8214

Investor Relations: Tel: +41 (0)58 285 7777

Pensionskasse Basel-Stadt

Susanne Jeger, Chief Executive Officer of PKBS

Email: susanne.jeger@pkbs.ch

Tel: +41 (0)61 267 8695

About Pensionskasse Basel-Stadt

PKBS manages workplace pensions for around 40,000 active policyholders and pension recipients of the canton of Basel-Stadt, the University of Basel, University Hospital Basel, the Basler Verkehrs-Betriebe (BVB) public transport operator, utility company IWB and other organisations linked to the canton of Basel-Stadt. With an aggregate volume of assets of approximately CHF 13.5 billion, PKBS is one of the biggest public-sector pension funds in Switzerland.

About Baloise Asset Management
Baloise Asset Management Schweiz AG has been in existence as an investment adviser and asset manager ever since the Corporate Division Asset Management (KB AM) was founded in 2001. Baloise Asset Management (BAM) meets the growing needs of the Group and of third parties for high-quality financial products and expert portfolio management. The Baloise pension investment foundation (BAP) was founded in 1995 for the management of funds in connection with Pillars 2 and 3a of the Swiss social security system. Luxembourg-based SICAV Baloise Fund Invest (LUX) (BFI) was founded in 2001 in order to offer proprietary fund solutions in Baloise’s retail business, while Baloise Immobilien Management AG commenced operations in 2018.