The headline could also be Capman - staff cost-cutting doesn’t concern us.
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Wasn’t this explained in the Q3 interview by the fact that those bonuses are paid partly with a 1-2 year delay “to ensure commitment”? So, if I’m not entirely mistaken, these bonuses now becoming payable (and feeling unreasonable) would be from somewhere between 2022-2023, when results did, however, manage to materialize.
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I assume this as well, meaning the next reports should show a decrease in expense lines. The earnings day was so busy that I didn’t have much time to delve into Capman’s report, but I did find this table from there:
I’m repeating myself, but the underlying engine seems to be developing at a good pace. Once that disappointment on the expense side, stemming from retroactively paid bonuses or any other reason, slowly fades away, it would hopefully start to show on the per-share line as well. Pia sounded confident in the earnings presentation that the 10 billion target for assets under management (by the end of 2028?) will be achieved, so I tried to read between the lines a bit, suggesting an acquisition might be in sight.
Sometimes the thought of the next strategy comes to mind, once that 10 billion in assets under management is eventually reached. Would it then be time to focus more on scalability and efficiency?
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Sauli has prepared a new company report on Capman. 
The Q4 report was largely in line with our expectations, and the big picture of the forecasts remains unchanged. We expect strong earnings growth from the company, and relative to this, the stock is not expensive. If our earnings forecasts materialize, we believe the return expectation is good, and a high dividend limits the stock’s downside.
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Tässä on Evlin kannanottoa Capmanin menoon. 
CapMan’s Q4 results were better than expected through good investment returns. Our expectations for 2025 reflect clear earnings improvement, with an in our view interesting near-term ahead due to significant fundraising activity and potential use of the strong cash position.
“With no material changes to our view, we retain our TP (ex-div of EUR 2.0) and BUY-rating.”
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According to their website, Midstar’s portfolio includes, among others, Scandic and Clarion hotels.
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Nyt tuli virallista tiedotetta
CapMan Real Estate fund CapMan Hotels II acquires Midstar Fastigheter AB, establishing a leading Nordic hotel platform
CapMan Hotels II (CMH II) has signed an agreement to acquire Midstar Fastigheter AB, a well-established Nordic hotel real estate portfolio, encompassing 28 assets in the Nordics. This transaction is one of the largest of its kind in the region and significantly expands and diversifies CapMan Hotels II’s Nordic hotel portfolio, strengthening its position as a key player in the Nordic hotel investment market. The transaction significantly contributes to CapMan Plc’s long-term objective to grow the company’s assets under management within real assets.
Midstar Fastigheter AB is a pan-Nordic property company focused exclusively on hotel real estate investments, with assets located in Sweden, Denmark, and Norway. The assets will be managed by CapMan Real Estate.
The acquired portfolio comprises 28 hotel properties, offering a total of 4,709 rooms, with plans to increase the capacity to 4,887 rooms by 2027 through targeted value-enhancing initiatives. The hotels complement CapMan Hotels II’s current portfolio very well with properties in major metropolitan areas such as Copenhagen, Stockholm, Gothenburg, and Oslo in addition to regional hotels in prime locations, aligning with CapMan’s focus on high-quality assets in key markets.
“We are excited about this transaction and its positive impact on our hotel fund. The acquisition of this high-quality portfolio outside of Finland strengthens our position as a key player in the Nordic hotel investment market, and it aligns perfectly with our investment strategy. We see significant potential in this platform and are confident in its ability to deliver strong returns, driven by the continued growth of the Nordic hotel market”, says Mika Matikainen, Managing Partner of CapMan Real Estate.
“CapMan Hotels II is a well-performing five-star rated fund in the GRESB sustainability benchmarking, and we are equally committed to enhance the sustainability performance of the Midstar Fastigheter portfolio. In addition to sustainability improvement efforts, we will be working closely with the hotel operators to identify and implement other value-enhancing initiatives”, says Thomas Laakso, Partner, CapMan Real Estate.
The acquisition grows CapMan’s assets under management by EUR 0.4 billion and significantly supports CapMan’s objective to increase assets under management to EUR 10 billion during the ongoing strategy period. It is also an excellent example of how CapMan can generate growth by scaling of existing products, which is one of CapMan’s three main growth levers alongside new product launches and M&A.
The agreement was signed on February 19th, 2025. The transaction is subject to customary regulatory approval from the Swedish Competition Authority and the transaction will close shortly after such approval has been granted.
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Here are my thoughts. A smart-looking arrangement that should be directly reflected in the key figures:
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Sauli’s comment left me a bit unclear on how the impact on management fees is only around 2-3% per year, while AUM grows by 6-7%. As I understand it, real estate fund fee levels are easily around one percent even for institutional investors, which would mean about 4M EUR (+7-8%) more on the fee income line and quite directly to the profit. Or does a larger part of the AUM growth go into the pockets of minority interests?
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Good question! CapMan didn’t elaborate much on the arrangement (likely at the counterparty’s request), and this is largely based on my own estimates. Firstly, the fee% for real estate funds is, to my understanding, lower than for PE and Infra. I also assume that the fee level for this new AUM would be closer to a real estate mandate (cf. BVK’s residential mandate, for example) than a typical real estate fund (I consider it possible that Midstar is sharing the fee in some way here). With this reasoning, I ended up using a lower fee level. I am certain that this fee is recurring.
In real estate, this growth should flow very efficiently to the bottom line, as the real estate team does not have minority holdings in CapMan Real Estate (unlike PE and Infra). Furthermore, it’s a scaling of an existing product, which CapMan also emphasized in its own press release.
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Here’s a relevant article on M&A in the real estate and private equity sectors, and the scale of the Apollo & Bridge acquisition. Could conclusions be drawn from this regarding the operating environment and competitive landscape for Capman/Taaleri/eQ and their peers?
CRE Analyst on LinkedIn:
”Apollo + Bridge = Four reasons you shouldn’t start a real estate fund
---- Headline ----
Apollo Global Management announced yesterday that it is acquiring Bridge Investment Group in a $1.5 billion all-stock deal. With this deal, Apollo’s real estate AUM jumps past $110 billion, pushing it into the top 10 of real estate investment managers.
This is part of a broader trend: scale wins. Deep-pocketed players with vast fundraising machines are swallowing niche specialists, extending their reach across asset classes.
---- Context ----
This is the second big investment manager merger in a week. Barings announced last week that it has reached an agreement to acquire Artemis.
---- Takeaways ----
The big real estate investment managers keep getting bigger, and there are fewer scraps for others.
Why?
- Fundraising:
The large fundraising machines cannot be matched. If you were a $10 billion pension fund, where would you send a $25 million real estate investment: Apollo or Joe’s bootstrapped industrial fund?
- Talent:
Blackstone reportedly received 62,000 applicants for 200 positions in 2023. That’s less than a 1% acceptance rate. Smaller platforms can compete, in theory, but talent matters, and top talent increasingly wants to be at large shops.
- Data:
An inherent benefit of having $100 billion portfolios relates to observation. When you’re sitting on hundreds of properties, you don’t need to pay for third-party data. You see markets evolving as they move. You see windows open and close.
- Scale:
In a world where the costs of admission–legal fees, startup costs, regulatory costs–are higher than ever, it’s much easier for billion dollar platforms to front these costs. Smaller firms increasingly have to pick their spots, which inherently limits opportunities.
---- Questions ----
Where does this leave mid-sized managers?
Is there still room for independent platforms, or are we heading toward an era where only mega-firms dominate?”
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Here are Sale’s pre-party comments on the upcoming Capman CMD hype.
CapMan is organizing a Capital Markets Day (CMD) on Tuesday, March 11th, starting at 1:00 PM. We expect the company to reiterate the ambitious growth targets launched in 2022, and profitable growth in the Management Business will continue to be at the core of the strategy. The company’s balance sheet is significantly overcapitalized, and guidelines related to the use of the balance sheet are one of the points of interest for the CMD. The CMD can be followed on InderesTV.
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Can @Sauli_Vilen give an opinion or irresponsible speculation on how Capman’s business will survive and perform in this market disruption going forward?
Capman has a strong desire to grow and invest. Money from Caps sales is burning a hole in their pocket. Now would be a buyer’s market, with pension companies selling, and Capman could take foreign investors’ money and put it into Nordic targets cheaply → scale growth, fees = profit 
. So the future looks promising and money will soon be coming in from all directions 
But then, looking in the rearview mirror, at least I’m a bit worried. You just commented on a Financial Times article where PE (Private Equity) exits are difficult when book values don’t quite match reality.
The zero-interest rate period lasted over a decade, and the hangover from it is still being suffered;
Capman’s AuM:
The CEO talks about a “value add” strategy. I understand the idea, but isn’t anyone else worried that those 3+ billion in real estate investments and 650 million in infrastructure investments contain accumulated value from the zero-interest rate era over the years? Perhaps they won’t need to be written down at any point, but merely digesting the zero-interest rate bomb could continue for years and years before book values begin to reflect what the assets would truly fetch if sold?
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Kasper interviewed CEO Pia Kåll at Capman’s Capital Markets Day.
Topics:
00:00 Introduction
00:17 Financial targets
04:33 Inorganic growth
06:18 Fund performance
07:27 Performance-based fees
09:02 Excess capital
10:05 Profit distribution
10:28 Investment portfolio
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Here are Kassu’s comments from the Capital Markets Day.
There were no changes to CapMan’s financial targets or the timeline for achieving them in connection with the Capital Markets Day, and the company still aims for 10 billion euros in assets under management by the end of 2027 (Q4’24: 6.1 billion). Otherwise, the day’s offering was very unsurprising, which, of course, is not a bad thing in long-term asset management business. Thus, the strategy will continue to focus on profitable scaling of the asset management business in the coming years. Scalability is sought particularly from personnel costs, which should grow slower than business revenues as CapMan’s investment areas are in a more mature phase. As there were no significant changes to the strategy, we encourage investors to still familiarize themselves with our current extensive report.
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This message sounds like PE activities will not be pursued going forward, but instead the focus will be on so-called real asset investments. The effect of this change will be that management fees for real asset funds are almost 50% lower than for PE funds, so AUM will indeed have to grow. Real asset investment activities are also very interest-rate sensitive compared to PE activities.
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Do forum members have a view on how a stock market crash predicted for the United States and possibly spreading from there to the rest of the world would affect Capman’s asset management fees and the returns from the company’s own investments?
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Board Member on the buy side:
Nature of the transaction: ACQUISITION
Volume: 26989 Average price: 1.8798 EUR
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CEO Pia Kåll’s review from last week’s general meeting! 
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The CEO mentioned that Capman has 1.3 billion in uninvested capital available. This American mess now plays right into the hands of this company!
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