THE SECURITISATION OF A HYPOTHETICAL SHOPPING CENTRE

Securitisation, unitisation and PINCS are all, in essence, very simple. They share a common objective of creating a market instrument which gives investors a return which is comparable to holding a direct interest in the freehold of a property at a fraction of the price. The only recent public transaction of this type to have proceeded is Billingsgate City Securities plc, which was a corporate securitisation. This paper analyses, by way of case study, a corporate securitisation involving the public issue of debt securities and preferred ordinary shares. The discussion is intended to stimulate thought about the problems that arise (and will tend to arise in any securitisation, unitisation or PINCS scheme), to suggest solutions and to demonstrate the flexibility of corporate securitisations. It should become apparent that the complexity of any particular structure is largely a function of the sophistication of the specific objectives of the property owner. It is the author's belief that the fact that the problem solving techniques used in a corporate securitisation are familiar (even though in a different context), makes corporate securitisations robust as well as flexible.