According to land registration documents examined by the on-line daily, MNB bought the Eiffel Palace from Qualmiston Limited and EFPA Estate Ingatlankezelő és Hasznosító Kft, which are in turn owned by the offshore company Stringston Limited. With the acquisition of the Bajcsy-Zsilinszky street building, MNB becomes the landlord of PriceWaterhouseCoopers and the British Chamber of Commerce.

At a reported purchase price of nearly HUF 850,000 (USD 3,700) per leasable square meter, Eiffel Palace is one of Budapest’s most expensive office buildings. According to commercial property brokerage website irodaz.hu, a nearly office building constructed in 1930 that previously served as the Hungarian headquarters of the Russian-owned Sberbank is for sale for an asking HUF 345,000 (USD 1500) per leasable sqm. MNB paid nearly two and one half times this amount per leasable sqm for Eiffel Palace.

According to the property’s website the 8-story office building contains 14,500 sqm of leasable space, 65 percent of which is currently leased. Originally built in 1893, the building serves as the headquarters and print house of Pesti Hirlap. The “three tower palace” suffered extensive damage during the Second World War, including the destruction of the main dome flanked by two smaller domes giving the building a highly distinctive appearance.

The luxury office building will take its place in the MNB’s burgeoning property portfolio alongside the Budapest Collegium, on Széntháromság square in the Castle District, which it earlier bought from the Hungarian Academy of Sciences for HUF 1.85 billion (USD 7.88 million).

Last week the MNB reluctantly confirmed that it had purchased a castle at Tiszaroff for HUF 415 million (USD 1.77 million), after it was revealed by weekly news magazine hvg. The central bank said it had bought the 30-room Austro-Hungarian mansion as part of its ‘social responsibility programme’, to offer holiday accommodation to its 1,000-plus staff. The MNB staff can look forward to weekends making use of the former hotel’s four-star facilities, which include a spa and swimming pools, a mini-golf course and sauna.

MNB was criticized this year for acquiring real estate and other valuable objects, including paintings and musical instruments, without first seeking permission from parliament. At the time MNB dismissed such criticism by claiming that, as an independent institution, Hungary’s central bank may do whatever it likes, and even filed a criminal complaint against on-line daily index.hu for publishing an article which accuses MNB of fiscal malfeasance. It also filed a criminal complaint against supervisory board member Peter Rona for comments made to ATV on the subject.

Source: The Budapest Beacon

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