Charter Hall Retail REIT Fund Manager changes

Charter Hall Retail REIT (CQR) today announces that Greg Chubb, Retail CEO and CQR Fund Manager has resigned to take up a senior role at Hong Kong listed Link REIT.

Charter Hall Group has appointed Ben Ellis as Retail CEO and CQR Fund Manager, taking on all the responsibilities previously held by Mr Chubb.

Ben Ellis has worked in various roles on the CQR portfolio for the past 21 years, initially responsible for Asset Management of the Australian portfolio, then all aspects of the European portfolio including its divestment once the Macquarie platform had been acquired by Charter Hall Group. Ben then returned to Australia managing the wholesale partnerships between CQR and Telstra Super and Mercer, as Head of Retail Wholesale, then more recently has been Head of Transactions across the Groups $62 billion property platform, overseeing $25 billion of gross transactions over the past 3 years.

Mr Ellis will report to Group Managing Director and CEO David Harrison, replacing Mr Chubb on the Group EXCO. He will also replace Mr Chubb as executive director of the CQR Responsible Entity board, Charter Hall Retail Management Ltd.

CQR Chair Mr Roger Davis said,

“We thank Greg for his contribution to the curation and evolution of the CQR portfolio over the past 5 years as Fund Manager and wish him well in his future endeavours. We are also pleased to see the depth of talent within Charter Hall allows for a smooth internal succession process with Ben having 2 decades of experience with the CQR portfolio, together with specific experience with the transactions in recent years that have added considerable value growth to CQR and diversified its portfolio income growth and resilience.”

David Harrison further added

“We are pleased to take advantage of the deep bench strength within Charter Hall to promote internally, with Ben having long term relationships with many of the people working hard to drive value within the CQR portfolio, together with excellent tenant customer relationships. His very strong wholesale partner relationships will provide for a seamless transition. We wish Greg well on his next career journey and thank him for his contribution.”

CQR reiterates that, barring any unforeseen events, FY22 earnings per unit (EPU) is expected to be no less than 28.2 cents per unit (cpu) representing growth of no less than 3.3% on FY21 earnings per unit.

FY22 distributions per unit (DPU) are expected to be no less than 24.3 cpu representing growth of no less than 3.8% on FY21 distributions per unit.

CQR will report the REIT’s Half-Year Financial Year 2022 Results on 23 February 2022.

Announcement Authorised by the Board

Click here to view the PDF ASX Announcement