Four bidders into final round for SA land
titles
Bid for South Australia's land titles registry are due at the end of June. Erin Jonasson
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by
Sarah Thompson
Anthony Macdonald
Joyce Moullakis
While property registry hopefuls await a phone call from NSW premier Gladys Berejiklian,
their deal teams have moved on to the next proposition.
Street Talk understands South Australia opened a second round dataroom for its own land
titles unit this week, with four parties taken through to the binding bid phase.
Three of the groups have shot straight across from the NSW process, and you would have to
assume their interest in South Australia is at least somewhat contingent on getting a positive
outcome at NSW.
Into the second round is the Hastings Funds Management/First State Super consortium,
advised by RBC Capital Markets and Lazard; ASX-listed Link with its partner and advised
by Credit Suisse; Borealis Infrastructure and Computershare, working with Macquarie
Capital; and Canadian registry company - and one time ASIC Registry hopeful - ISC.
South Australia treasurer Tom Koutsantonis is seeking binding offers by the end of June,
sources said.
Bids are expected to be north of the $500 million mark.
Up for grabs is the right to run South Australia's land titles office for the next 40-years.
According to preliminary marketing material, the SA land titles office processes more than
208,000 property dealings each year including 51,000 transfers with a total sale last financial
year of more than $18 billion, 61,000 mortgages, 555,000 mortgage discharges and about
40,000 other dealings.
Investec, along with fellow advisers HW Ebsworth and KPMG, is running the three stage
auction which has already been through expressions of interest and indicative bids.
It comes as the four bidders for NSW's titling and land registries unit wait to hear back from
NSW Treasury.
Each of the bidders pitched their business plan and credentials to Treasury and NSW LPI
officials this week, as the auction draws to a close.
Read more: http://www.afr.com/street-talk/four-bidders-into-final-round-for-sa-land-titles20170405-gveq6v#ixzz4dW54XWXR
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