Canary Wharf Group (“CWG”), the developer of the largest urban regeneration project in Europe, announces that its shareholders, Brookfield and the Qatar Investment Authority, have committed £400 million to the company by way of a £300 million equity subscription and a £100 million revolving credit facility.
The company owns The Shard, a skyscraper in London designed by Renzo Piano and the publicly funded Olympic village also known as East Village, London; and the former Royal Dutch Shell plc headquarters.
It is among the dozen biggest property owners in Britain. Central to its property empire are landmarks including the Shard, Canary Wharf and the Shell Centre redevelopment on London's South Bank. The Qatari government also owns luxury department store Harrods and 5* hotel Claridge's in London.
According to The Times, the Savoy is part-owned by Qatar's sovereign wealth fund, the Ritz was bought by a Qatari businessman who is the brother-in-law of Qatar's rulers in 2020, and the Connaught is owned by Hamad bin Jassim, who was Qatar's prime minister when Hamas relocated to Doha.
Two years after the tower's completion, the QIA aimed high again, buying HSBC's headquarters at 8 Canada Square in Docklands for £1.1bn. It swiftly followed that up by leading a consortium that bought Canary Wharf Group in a £2.6bn takeover.
A cursory look at Property Week shows that the Qatari Investment Authority, Qatari Holding and Qatari Diar own 23,253,699 square feet of London, making Qatar the largest owner of London property. Reports vary about the sum invested, alleged to be £35 billion.
The supermarket chain alone has 600 stores across the UK and 40 in Greater Manchester. With a 14.9 per cent share of J Sainsbury's PLC, Qatar's stake dwarves that of investment giant BlackRock, who own 6 per cent of the company.
Harrods is a British luxury department store located on Brompton Road in Knightsbridge, London, England. It is owned by Harrods Ltd, a company currently owned by the state of Qatar via its sovereign wealth fund, the Qatar Investment Authority as part of Qatar's global soft power strategy.
The airport is owned and operated by Heathrow Airport Holdings, owned mostly by FGP and Qatar Investment Authority and CDPQ.. In 2022, it was the second-busiest airport in the world by international passenger traffic and the busiest airport in Europe as per March 2023.
Heathrow Airport Holdings Limited is in turn owned by FGP Topco Limited, a consortium owned and led by the infrastructure specialist Ferrovial S.A. (25.00%), Qatar Investment Authority (20.00%), Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec (CDPQ) (12.62%), GIC (11.20%), Australian Retirement Trust (11.18%), China Investment ...
Among the most notable investments include Harrods, the Shard building, Canary Wharf and a stake in the London Stock Exchange. Qatar Investment Authority also owns 22% of Sainsbury and nearly 6% in Barclays bank. It also has a 20% stake in Heathrow Airport Holdings.
Canary Wharf is a privately owned Estate owned by Canary Wharf Group plc. As owners of the Estate, we have a duty to ensure that any activity that takes place there including filming and photography is safe, carries the correct insurance, minimises disruption and does not compromise security.
Shobi Khan is the Chief Executive Officer of Canary Wharf Group. He has worked in the real estate industry for more than 30 years and joined Canary Wharf Group in October 2019.
That George Iacobescu was even in London in 1986 was itself nothing short of remarkable. Born and educated in socialist Romania, he had emigrated to Canada in 1975 after he was “sold” by the authorities to an aunt who lived in Montréal for US$5,000.
The investment in London Heathrow Airport by Qatar, Singapore's GIC sovereign wealth fund, and Alinda Capital Partners reflects a strategic move for several reasons: 1. Strategic Asset: Heathrow is one of the world's busiest airports, making it a highly valuable and strategic asset.
As of 2021, the largest overall shareholder is the sovereign wealth fund of Qatar, the Qatar Investment Authority, which holds 14.99% of the company. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index.
Central Group, controlled by the Thai Chirathivat family, and Austrian real estate specialists Signa Group, will take control of Selfridges in a 50-50 joint venture. It is understood they have beaten off a raft of rival bids, including from the Qatar Investment Authority which owns Harrods.
Barclays said QIA owned 847.6m shares before the sale, giving it a 5.6% stake, after reducing the holding from 1bn shares in January 2022. Monday's sale represented 43% of the holding and left QIA with 486m shares, equivalent to a 3.2% stake, leaving it as Barclays' fourth biggest investor.
Investments. In 2013, Hamad established the Qatar Investment Authority, which has invested over $100 billion around the world, most prominently in The Shard, Barclays Bank, Heathrow Airport, Harrods, Paris Saint-Germain F.C., Siemens and Royal Dutch Shell.
The glass-clad pyramidal tower has 72 habitable floors, with a viewing gallery and open-air observation deck on the 72nd floor, at a height of 244 metres (801 ft). The Shard was developed by Sellar Property Group on behalf of LBQ Ltd and is jointly owned by Sellar Property (5%) and the State of Qatar (95%).
Al Thani is one of the richest people in the world, having overseen Qatar's $230 billion sovereign wealth fund until 2013. He has been named "the man who bought London" by British tabloids; his holdings in London include the Shard, Harrods, and the InterContinental London Park Lane.
Qatar is about 21 times smaller than United Kingdom. United Kingdom is approximately 243,610 sq km, while Qatar is approximately 11,586 sq km, making Qatar 4.76% the size of United Kingdom. Meanwhile, the population of United Kingdom is ~67.8 million people (65.3 million fewer people live in Qatar).
As noble Lords may be aware, 20,000 British nationals live and work in Qatar, and the UK is a second home to many Qataris. In 2019, prior to the pandemic, there were a record 175,000 visits from Qatar to the UK, worth more than £0.5 billion to the UK economy.
