Agnelli family to sell Cushman and Wakefield
ITALY’S Agnelli family has put real estate advisory giant Cushman & Wakefield up for sale in a deal that could fetch up to $2bn (£1.3bn)
Exor, the investment arm of the Agnelli family, has approved management’s hiring of bankers Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley to help find a buyer for the business.
“As is the normal course of business, both Cushman & Wakefield and Exor continually seek ways to further enhance the businesses, create value and further accelerate their plans,” Cushman said in a statement
“There is currently no transaction to disclose, nor guarantee that such a review may result in any transaction involving Cushman & Wakefield,” the company added.
The company, which was founded in New York almost a century ago, is the world’s third biggest property services group after CBRE and JLL, with 250 offices in 60 countries.
The Agnelli family, best known for their control of car maker Fiat, bought 67.5 per cent stake in Cushman for around £364.5m in 2007.
It has since upped its stake to 81 per cent while the rest is owned by employees.
Like many of its property peers, Cushman suffered huge losses following the financial crisis as property values plummeted and it lost several top executives. Over the past couple of years it has benefitted from a recovery in the property market and last year brought in a new chief executive, former Goldman Sachs director Edward Forst.
Revenues rose to $2.5bn in 2013, up from $2bn the previous year on adjusted earnings of $145m.