Protego appoints Nordic retail professional

The London-based firm with a Nordic retail closed ended vehicle has hired Calum Barclay as an associate to work on acquisitions, disposals and portfolio management.

Protego Real Estate Investors has appointed Calum Barclay from Australian financial services company Mariner for its Nordic retail fund.

Barclay has become an associate, the firm said in a statement, and is based in the London office. He will report to Nordic retail fund manager, Ed Fenn-Smith.

Prior to joining Protego, he was investment manager for Mariner responsible for investment strategy and real estate acquisitions in Europe. He has also worked at property services firm DTZ as a surveyor.

Protego’s Nordic fund launched in 2007 and has around €1.2 billion ($1.6 billion) of assets in Sweden, Finland, Norway and Denmark currently under management.

Towards the end of last year, the firm managed to refinance €266 million of loans taken out to acquire Swedish assets. Swedish banks SEB and DnB Nord provided the senior five-year facility. It also said €60 million of senior debt had been secured against the Nordic fund’s two Finnish regional shopping centres.