The founder of Inditex weighs buying the company’s future headquarters in Dublin
The investment machinery of Amancio Ortega continues to advance at full speed. After landing in the logistics sector in recent months, the founder of Inditex is considering, through his investment arm Pontegadea, buying the future headquarters of Meta, the conglomerate that groups Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, in Dublin, for 550 million euros. euros , as revealed by the “React News” portal. In the case of materializing the operation, whose negotiations could be advanced, Ortega would become the owner of the Fibonacci Square office project, with an area of 100,000 square meters, six buildings and capacity to house 8,000 people. From Pontegadea they have declined to comment on said transaction, according to Ep.
With this purchase, the founder of Inditex would add a new asset to his investment portfolio. The latest has been the acquisition of a logistics asset in the United States, specifically a distribution center in Philadelphia (Pennsylvania), for an amount of 148 million dollars (about 147 million euros). This is the second asset of this type that the founder of Inditex acquires in the North American country after last August he took over a platform occupied by the company FedEx in Menomonee Falls in Wisconsin (United States) for an amount of 35 million dollars (about 34 million euros).
The founder of Inditex invests part of the dividends he receives from the textile company in the real estate sector through his investment firm Pontegadea Inmobiliaria. In fact, Ortega owns the largest Spanish real estate company , with a portfolio of real estate assets made up mainly of non-residential office buildings located in the center of large cities in Spain, the United Kingdom, the United States and Asia.
Diverse giant
Along with investments in real estate, the firm has been making purchases in other sectors for years to diversify its portfolio. As a result of this roadmap, at the end of July it announced the purchase of a 49% stake in Repsol’s “Kappa” photovoltaic complex , located in Manzanares (Ciudad Real), for an amount of 27 million euros; and the acquisition of 5% of Enagás Renovable. In November, it invested another 245 million euros to take a 49% stake in Repsol’s Delta wind farm (Zaragoza), in what was its first operation in the renewable sector. It was not, however, his first commitment to the energy sector. Its first investments in this field date back to December 2019. It was then that it acquired the5% of Enagás for 281.64 million euros. Ortega is the largest shareholder of the firm together with the State, which controls another 5% of the company in charge of managing gas infrastructures in Spain through the State Industrial Participation Company (SEPI). In the summer of 2021, the founder of Inditex continued to expand his portfolio in the energy sector with the purchase of another 5% of Red Eléctrica Española (REE) and 12% of Redes Energéticas Nacionais (REN), both in charge of managing the transmission and distribution of electricity in Spain and Portugal. While its stake in REE is valued at around 456 million euros, that of REN amounts to approximately 188 million. In the case of the Spanish company, its 5% makes Pontegadea the second largest shareholder only behind SEPI, which has another 20% stake.
Last year, Pontegadea almost tripled its profit, reaching 1,606 million euros , although these profits are still 10% below the levels of 2019, just before the pandemic. What has already recovered the values prior to the coronavirus is its real estate assets, whose value rose by 8% to reach 15,264 million. The portfolio thus exceeds both the figures for 2020 -14,075 million- and those for 2019 -15,163 million-.
