When Petrus Advisers is about to get started, many managers get nervous. This is because the asset manager quickly sees untapped potential in companies. In Germany, he holds shares in the software company Teamviewer, in the two real estate financiers Pfandbriefbank (PBB) and Aareal Bank. Klaus Umek, CEO of the company from Austria and with experience in investment banking at Goldman Sachs, founded Petrus about a decade and a half ago as an alternative asset manager with several funds for institutional and private investors.
Michaela Seiser
Business correspondent for Austria and Hungary based in Vienna.
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The fund volume amounts to more than one billion euros. Petrus sees himself better than the market in terms of development and volatility. In addition to ecological awareness, the goals of commitments are social commitment and responsible leadership. He pursues an active and entrepreneurial approach. This means a dialogue with management. This also exists in the case of Teamviewer: Umek and its partners see a credibility problem with regard to the management team despite the attractive growth profile and recommendations on ESG (Environment, Social, Governance). "There are questionable and expensive sports sponsorship activities that inflate the cost base," Umek said on Thursday in Vienna. He also criticises a suboptimal capital structure that prevents a more shareholder-friendly distribution of capital. That is why Peter is calling for an early end to sports sponsorship and a new buyback program.
At Pfandbriefbank, the financier of commercial real estate, he also criticises the discount at book value and puts it at two-thirds. "Over the past few years, management has built up enormous buffers in various places that tie up capital inefficiently." These include excessive provision for loan defaults, excess regulatory capital and the overweighting of risk-weighted assets. In addition, bank management has increased costs – unlike other listed German financial institutions – and thus lost productivity. Andreas Arndt, chairman of PBB, reacted negatively to the criticism: "In the current situation, it is out of the question for us to think about increased capital levies, such as in the form of share buybacks. Because we see a market environment with considerable stress," Arndt told Bloomberg. In the United States, several smaller banks had slid into insolvency in recent weeks, and in Europe, the major bank Credit Suisse was sold to its domestic competitor UBS with the backing of the Swiss government.
Umek, on the other hand, takes a different view of the investment in Aareal Bank, which is clearly on the upswing in the wake of the takeover by financial investors. Petrus will reinvest with the real estate financier from Wiesbaden. Petrus Advisers has also rejoined the real estate group Immofinanz after a break of around a year.