Leveraging assets should be a walk in the park for Troy Bowker who spent a decade working as an investment banker in London and New York before returning to New Zealand to create his own investment empire.
Founded in 2008, Caniwi Capital Partners has built up a $300 million property portfolio that includes student accommodation, commercial property and even a chicken processing facility leased to Tegel. One of the biggest assets is the $37.5 million Katharine Jermyn Hall in Boulcott St, which provides accommodation for first-year Victoria University students.
Bowker’s investment approach is focused on the value of lease cashflows and the portfolio boasts a weighted average lease term (WALT) of more than 19 years. “We invest in assets with long leases and that enables us to fund them with a relatively less conservative debt gearing and take advantage of the financial arbitrage.” Not that Caniwi is afraid to sell. A commercial office block bought for $43.5m in 2012 was sold less than four years later for $56m.
Caniwi’s private equity division aims to acquire high-quality small- to medium-sized enterprises with a goal of building a $100m portfolio over the next two years. “We continue to see value in acquiring businesses within the size range we are targeting and we are achieving very high returns on equity through a combination of improved management, financial processes and governance” Bowker says.
The latest purchase, for an undisclosed sum, is Auckland-based Lancer Aluminium, which Bowker says will give him exposure to the booming Auckland residential construction market. "Virtually every home is going to have aluminium doors and windows. Companies like Lancer are central to the government achieving its KiwiBuild policy objectives.”
Born and raised in Hawke’s Bay, Bowker graduated with a bachelor of management studies from Waikato University before moving to the University of Auckland where he then completed a masters degree in tax policy and economics while working for Ernst & Young.
In London during the heady pre-global financial crisis financial boom, he spent time at Lehman Brothers, Swiss Re and HSBC as an adviser and investment banker. However, Bowker sensed the markets were becoming overheated and decided to sell up and return home with his young family just before the bubble burst. Having “made a bit of money” over the previous decade, he says “the time to invest my own capital was at the bottom of the market, so it was about picking when that was going to occur.”
A keen sportsman, Bowker has recruited Olympic rower Rob Waddell as a partner in a new regional investment fund and in early 2018 he bought a 12.5% stake in the Hurricanes rugby franchise.