Futureal Group signed a loan agreement for €150 million (roughly HUF 48 billion) with a consortium led by UniCredit acting as Bookrunner and Facility Agent. UniCredit and Erste Group will finance Buda's biggest shopping centre with equal parts, marking one of the largest shopping centre-related financings in Hungary over the past ten years. The construction of Etele Plaza, with a gross area of 137,000 square meters, is already underway.

Immofinanz has renounced its plans for the construction of a Stop Shop retail park in Braşov citing the lengthy process of obtaining a construction permit. The developer is considering selling the land.

NEPI Rockcastle announced the acquisition of 100% of Mammut 2 and 81% of Mammut 1, which jointly form the Mammut shopping centre in Budapest. The aggregate net purchase price for the acquisition was €254 million, according to the company's statement.

South African real estate investment trust Hyprop Investments has acquired a hypermarket adjacent to its shopping centre The Mall in the Bulgarian capital for €23 million back in June.

pbb Deutsche Pfandbriefbank provided a facility of €68 million to ECE. pbb acted as arranger and sole lender under the facility.

The first half of 2018 on the Polish shopping centres market belonged to the biggest agglomerations. Over 172,000 sqm of new space was delivered, which constitutes about 75% of domestic supply. At the same time, the demand for retail space was still very high and the level of vacant buildings remained very low.

Oradea Shopping City, the Romanian city’s second largest shopping centre which is currently going through a second bankruptcy, has been purchased by the shareholders of Lotus Center Mall, the city’s largest shopping centre, for €8 million.

PKO Bank Polski has granted an investment loan of €186 million to EPP for the refinancing of two assets, the Galeria Echo shopping centre in Kielce and the O3 Business Campus in Kraków.

The record-breaking era of the Polish retail sector is over now. The market is shaped by limited supply, increased competition, the growth of e-commerce and the aftereffects of the ban on Sunday trading. As pointed out by experts at BNP Paribas Real Estate Poland, in H1 2018 developers operating on the Polish market completed and delivered approx. 191 000 sqm of modern retail space, out of which 110 000 sqm appeared on the market between April and June. As expected, further 300 000 sqm of new supply will be delivered by the end of the year.

Retailers and shopping centre operators are starting to adapt their business models to the changing consumer behaviour. For now, it seems that retailers that are able to create a true omnichannel approach are outperforming their competitors. Walter Wolfler, Senior Director, Head of Retail Austria & CEE at CBRE talked to Property Forum about the future of retail.