Starwood Capital and pbb Announce a Strategic Partnership in CRE Lending

MIAMI and MUNICH – 24 October 2024 – Starwood Capital Group (“Starwood Capital”), a leading global private investment firm focused on real estate, and Deutsche Pfandbriefbank AG (“pbb” or “the bank”), a leading European specialist bank for commercial real estate finance, today announced they have signed a Memorandum of Understanding to finalise a strategic partnership in CRE lending. The partnership will enable Starwood Capital and pbb to participate in joint lending and origination, as well as explore other strategic initiatives aimed at optimizing pbb’s profitability in line with its Strategy 2027, whilst continuing to provide most efficient financing solutions to the institutional clients of the respective institutions.

Through this partnership, Starwood Capital and pbb will leverage their combined real estate expertise and strong market presence across Europe, including access to different sources of capital and funding, to originate and execute loans for their respective clients and provide premier loan solutions.

In addition, the parties will explore a potential advisory relationship between pbb and Starwood Solutions to assist in providing supplementary market and asset-level insights with a primary focus on selected CRE loan positions in the United States. Starwood Solutions is a subsidiary of Starwood Property Trust (NYSE: STWD), the largest commercial mortgage REIT in the United States, and provides advisory services to commercial banks and non-bank third-party institutions in the United States and globally.

This strategic partnership underpins pbb’s Strategy 2027, including the Bank’s ‘Originate & Cooperate’ strategy within its new Real Estate Investment Solutions business line. This strategy, launched on 10 October 2024, aims to leverage the bank’s financing platform by collaborating with third parties.

“We are delighted to work with such a valuable partner,” said Kay Wolf, CEO of pbb. “Starwood Capital is an important, well-regarded investment firm with which we have a long-standing business relationship. I am convinced that jointly and programmatically, we can add further value for our customers.”

"Starwood Capital is delighted to enter this strategic partnership with Deutsche Pfandbriefbank,” said Lorcain Egan, Co-Head of Europe at Starwood Capital. “pbb is a leading European commercial real estate lender and has built a strong, global reputation as a premier loan provider across high growth sectors in core CRE markets. This partnership reaffirms Starwood Capital’s long-term focus on expanding the depth of coverage of our commercial real estate lending franchise."

Irakli Meskhi, Co-Head of Debt Origination, Europe at Starwood Capital, added: "We are incredibly excited to extend our long-standing relationship with the pbb team and support our collective goals to accelerate growth of our lending platforms. This partnership builds on our complementary sector expertise and provides a platform for both institutions to increase our combined market coverage and strengthen our competitive position in our core CRE lending markets."

About Starwood Capital Group:
Starwood Capital Group is a private investment firm with a core focus on global real estate. The Firm and its affiliates maintain 16 offices in seven countries around the world, and currently have 5,000+ employees. Since its inception in 1991, Starwood Capital Group has raised over $80 billion of capital, and currently has ~$115 billion of assets under management. Through a series of comingled opportunity funds and Starwood Real Estate Income Trust, Inc. (SREIT), a non-listed REIT, the Firm has invested in virtually every category of real estate on a global basis, opportunistically shifting asset classes, geographies and positions in the capital stack as it perceives risk/reward dynamics to be evolving. Starwood Capital also manages Starwood Property Trust (NYSE: STWD), the largest commercial mortgage real estate investment trust in the United States, which has successfully deployed over $98 billion of capital since inception and manages a portfolio of over $26 billion across debt and equity investments. Over the past 33 years, Starwood Capital Group and its affiliates have successfully executed an investment strategy that involves building enterprises in both the private and public markets. Additional information can be found at www.starwoodcapital.com.

About pbb:
pbb Deutsche Pfandbriefbank (www.pfandbriefbank.com) is a leading European specialist lender for commercial real estate finance in Europe and the United States of America. pbb is a major issuer of Pfandbriefe, which makes it also an important player in the European covered bond markets overall. pbb's shares are listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange.