ABSTRACT

The relationship that the opportunity funds had with limited partnership investors placed much more emphasis on limited than partner. Once the capital was handed over, the opportunity funds were like black boxes to investors as they had full discretion over all investments and strategies. By the early 2000s, the US opportunity funds were too embedded in Europe to pull back. The Canary Wharf takeover grazed the bottom of the London office market on its way up to become one of the most successful real estate transactions of the decade. The Canary Wharf deal supported the bank's growing agenda to use the transaction to generate fees for the bank. AM, renamed Multi Developments, formed a central plank in this pipeline with a programme of EUR9 billion and a presence in mature European markets such as the Netherlands, France, Germany, Spain and Italy, as well as growth markets such as Turkey and Central Europe.