Tuesday, September 26, 2017

This is Nuts: Farmland Partners Buys $110m Almond, Pistachio Property from Olam

We aren't doing anything with farmland, yet. For a publicly traded entity the equation is a bit different: if they don't deploy the capital they get those pesky "What, are you just a SPAC?" questions at the annual meeting. Here's the recent performance of this one via FinViz:

FPI Farmland Partners Inc. daily Stock Chart
Discerning reader knows full well from whom I purloined the first part of the headline.
From Agrimoney Sept 25:
Farmland Partners, fresh from a fund raise, unveiled one of its biggest acquisitions ever, with the purchase of California nut orchards from ag trading giant Olam International.

Farmland Partners said it had agreed to pay $110m for the almond, pistachio and walnut land, under a deal which will see Singapore-based OIam International keep a 25-year farming agreement at the site.

The deal, which including a revenue share agreement with Olam on the orchards, represents one of Farmland Partners' largest ever, in financial terms.

By area, the purchase, at 5,100 acres, will take the Farmland Partners portfolio to some 159,000 acres.

Row crops vs specialty crops
The purchase comes a month after the group raised $144m from the sale of 6.0m preference shares, with the company saying at the time it would "use the net proceeds from the offering for future farmland acquisitions".

While Farmland Partners, which began with a small portfolio of Illinois land, initially focused on row crops farms, a more liquid and less expensive market, it has increasingly spread into land bearing permanent or higher value crops.

Paul Pittman, the Farmland Partners chairman and chief executive, told investors in July that "we want to maintain an approximate balance of 75%, 25% between the primary row crops and the specialty crops, meaning the vegetables and the permanent crops".

However, the ratio could reach "something like 65%, 35% maybe in the extreme case", depending on factors such as expected returns from rents and capital appreciation.

Indeed, Mr Pittman hinted at the time that row crop land had become less of a priority, saying that "even if I like the long-term appreciation opportunity of an asset we see in the core of the Midwest, it's just really hard to make the math work on a current yield basis, from a cost of capital perspective"....MORE
Previously on the REITs:
REITS: "Farmland Partners' land-buying spree tops $50m" (FPI)
US land market at weakest in at least nine years
Real Estate Investment Trusts Down On The Farm: Farmland Partners Looks to Buy $100 Million Worth of Land (FPI; LAND)
Farmland REITS Go Shopping In Florida (FPI; LAND; AFCO)
Farmland REITs: "Farmland Partners eyes more deals - even after American Farmland purchase" (FPI)

For strategy see also:
A Higher Yielding Alternative to Corn and Wheat: "Agriculture Investors Develop a Taste for Permanent Crops"
We've highlighted Singapore Investment Fund Temesek's purchase of #2 almond producer Olam and Interest Rate Observer's black walnut buy rec. Here's more, from Institutional Investor:,,,