MADRID/LONDON, Sept 24 (Reuters) - Canada's pension fund CPPIB has hired U.S. investment bank Citi C.N to explore the sale of its 39% stake in European car park manager Interparking, several sources close to the matter said.
The deal adds to the string of parking assets that have come to market market in recent years as some pension funds and private equity firms struggle to make them profitable with people reducing car ownership and relying more on ride-sharing.
Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, which bought the Interparking stake for 376 million euros ($413.75 million) in 2014, and Citi declined to comment.
The Interparking Group has more than 800 car parks in nine countries, with leading market shares in Belgium, The Netherlands and Germany. Its turnover in 2018 was 463.5 million euros ($510.04 million) and earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) reached 148.7 million euros.
One of the sources put the enterprise value of the company at between 3 billion euros and 3.5 billion euros.
Interparking was CPPIB's first investment in European car parking. It bought its minority stake from Belgium-based AG Real Estate, which still holds 51%.
Concessions and car parks are likely to attract the interest of private equity, infrastructure and pension funds.
Buyout group Centerbridge is also in the market with Interparking peer Apcoa, sparking interest from infrastructure and private equity investors. First-round bids for Apcoa were due last week. the holding company of CaixaBank, is also looking to sell a stake in car park group Saba in a deal that could value it at up to 1.2 billion euros ($1.3 billion) including debt, sources previously said.
($1 = 0.9088 euros)