CPPIB, Phoenix Mills to Develop Retail Center in India

The Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB) is developing a shopping center in the affluent Alipore, Kolkata, neighborhood in India, as part of a new joint venture with mall operator Phoenix Mills.

India is an important destination for CPPIB, the pension fund said last week. The joint venture will fund the mall with about $77 million (C$93 million), which will be invested in tranches into Mindstone Mall Developers Private.

After construction is completed in the latter part of 2024, CPPIB will take a 49% equity stake in the retail center. The mall in Kolkata, a business hub with several large technology and banking firms, will be designed by international architects.

“India is one of the most important markets for us in Asia Pacific and a critical part of our long-term strategy,” Hari Krishna, managing director of real estate in India at CPPIB, said in a statement.

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The pension fund has boots on the ground in the country. In 2015, the $411.7 billion (C$497.2 billion) allocator opens its sixth international office in Mumbai, attracted to the country’s demographics. CPPIB also has offices in Hong Kong, London, Luxembourg, New York, and São Paulo.

India has a growing middle class. It also has among the world’s fastest-growing workforces, which is poised to be the largest internationally in a couple years. Financing for infrastructure, real estate, and public and private equities is set for more growth.

It’s not the first time CPPIB has partnered up with Phoenix Mills. Multiple ventures with the mall operator over the past several years are now amounting to more than $360 million (INR 26.2 billion).

In 2017, the two formed a joint venture to develop mixed-use retail developments across India, investing $110 million into Island Star Mall Developers Private Limited (ISMDPL) for the purpose.

The two parties are extending their commitments to that venture. Among the assets they own are the Phoenix Marketcity in Whitefield, Bangalore. Through ISMDPL, the two are also developing three retail-led, mixed-use developments at Wakad Pune, a suburb in central India; Hebbal Bangalore in the southern part of the country; and Indore in west central India.

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Tags: Asset, Asset Management, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, CPPIB, India, Investment, Pension

New AIG CIO Geoff Cornell

American International Group Inc. (AIG) Chief Investment Officer Douglas Dachille is stepping down from his post at the end of June, and the insurance giant has named Deputy CIO Geoff Cornell as his successor.

Dachille became the CIO of AIG and took charge of its more than $350 billion portfolio in July 2015 when the company acquired fixed-income manager First Principles Capital Management, where Dachille was a co-founder and had been CEO since 2003. Dachille took over for then-retiring CIO Bill Dooley, who had been with AIG for nearly 40 years. The company did not say whether Dachille was retiring or moving on to another position elsewhere.

Prior to co-founding First Principles, Dachille was president of Zurich Capital Markets and spent a significant part of his career at JP Morgan, where he headed global proprietary trading and was co-treasurer. Dachille has a bachelor of science from Union College and was a Pew scholar in medicine, arts, and social sciences at the University of Chicago.

Cornell, who joined AIG in 1994, has been deputy CIO since October 2013, overseeing certain public market portfolios, including high-grade and high-yield corporate debt, municipal securities, and investment strategy and sovereign research. Prior to that, he was regional CIO for North America and was responsible for developing strategic asset allocation and managing investment portfolios for the AIG Property Casualty North America region.

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Cornell has a bachelor’s in finance from Bryant University and a Master of Business Administration in finance from Fordham University.

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Tags: AIG, Bill Dooley, CIO, Douglas Dachille, First Principles Capital Management, Geoff Cornell, SEC