EXCLUSIVE: Property magnate Frank Boyd, owner of Belfast's Connswater shopping centre, has reached an agreement with Cerberus to buy back his quarter of a billion pound property portfolio, which was placed into Nama five years ago.
Mr Boyd (61), one of the north's wealthiest men, is understood to have paid £100 million to resume control of his Killultagh Estates and other properties, which were valued at £228 million when they were transferred into the Nama bad bank in 2010.
The refinancing has been arranged through Luxembourg-based ICG-Longbow, an investment manager focused on the UK commercial property debt markets. The legals on the deal were signed off by Tughans Solicitors.
Mr Boyd, who lives on the 500-acre Rademon Estate near Crossgar, is the latest developer to strike an arrangement with the US hedge fund Cerberus to buy back their portfolios often at a fraction of what they were valued at when placed into Nama.
Cerberus's £1.3 billion purchase of the Nama loans - the so-called Project Eagle deal - has been been shrouded in controversy following claims that a number of political and business figures were to benefit from a £7.5 million "success fee" payment.
First Minister Peter Robinson was among those named under privilege at Stormont by loyalist flag protester and blogger Jamie Bryson as being in line for a stake of that £7.5m pot - as was Belfast-based property developer Andrew Creighton, a business partner of Frank Boyd. Mr Robinson and Mr Creighton have both denied the claim.
Before going into Nama, Killultagh Estates Ltd was one of Northern Ireland's biggest property firms, controlling a number of shopping centres which included Connswater in east Belfast as well as others in England and Ireland.
Mr Boyd - who left school at 16 and served his apprenticeship as an electrician before starting his own electrical engineering company which he sold in 2002 for £2m - is listed by Companies House as holding 68 current or past directorships
In 2002 he and developer partner Andrew Creighton, who owned William Ewart Properties, bought Dunloe Ewart plc’s Northern Ireland and UK assets for £100m, and they were subsequently behind plans for the £500m Royal Exchange regeneration project in Belfast city centre, which aimed to provide retail, office, hotel and residential developments.
Mr Boyd is among a raft of larger Project Eagle creditors to refinance their loans, which means they have cleared their liabilities to Cerberus.
When asked about Boyd's refinancing, Cerberus said they "don't comment on individual cases due to commercial sensitivities".
But the Irish News understands that Cerberus has now reached agreement with borrowers responsible for 96 per cent of the unpaid loans it acquired as a result of Project Eagle.
