Tomás Olivo buys another shopping centre in the Canaries.

Spanish REIT, General de Galerías Comerciales SOCIMI S.A., (YGGC:SM) has paid €42 million for Las Terrazas Shopping centre which is located in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, the second largest island in the Canary Islands as well as a major cruise-ship port and an important tourist destination.

General De Galerias Comerciales SOCIMI S.A., which is led by property mogul, Tomás Olivo, recently paid over €45 million to buy El Mirador de Jinamar Shopping Centre which is located next to Las Terrazas.

Las Terrazas opened in October 2008 and is a mixed use open-air shopping centre which includes a factory outlet and retail warehouse area. It suffered during the financial crisis but continues to attract over 5 million visitors per annum.

The buyer intends to create synergies between El Mirador and Las Terrazas which combined would have a GLA of over 107,000m² and would be the largest retail destination in the Canaries. Furthermore, an additional 38,000m2 retail park could be developed in the land surrounding El Mirador. Both enjoy a prominent location next to the busy GC-1 motorway, the main connection for the island between north and south with traffic of around 40 million cars a year (Fomento 2018).

A dominant regional retail complex could potentially attract over 2 million consumers from the various islands that form the Spanish region of the Canaries. In fact, the islands are well connected by air and sea and there are daily connections between the islands thanks to ferry companies such as Naviera Armas, Transmediterranea and Fred Olson. However, in the immediate future, the catchment area includes the 850,000 people that live in the Canaries all year round.

The Canaries have an attractive population growth trend, having outpaced the Spanish average over the last decade. In fact, the Province of Gran Canaria (incl, Lanzarote and Fuerteventura) have grown at a rate of nearly 10% since 2008.