Singapore’s SC Capital set sights on Japanese hotels with $550m fund

Singapore’s SC Capital Partners aims to raise around $550 million for a new fund targeting hard-hit Japanese hotels, its chairman told Reuters, betting tourism will come back strongly once the coronavirus pandemic subsides.

The asset manager is one of a number of foreign investors, including Blackstone Group, aiming to scoop up Japanese hotels as owners put assets up for sale to generate cash.

“I believe very strongly that the trend of foreign visitors coming to Japan will recover and gather strength and continue for a very long time,” Suchad Chiaranussati, chairman and founder of SC Capital Partners, told Reuters in an interview.

“And among all the Asia Pacific markets, today I am most optimistic on the recovery of tourism in Japan.”

Before the pandemic, Japan had been in the midst of a tourism boom with the annual number of foreign visitors more than doubling in five years to 32 million in 2019. That number was only expected to increase with the 2020 Olympics, which helped fuel a hotel construction boom. But those hopes unravelled after the pandemic sent occupancy rates tumbling. After a year’s delay, the Olympics finished this month - without spectators or a tourism boost.

SC Capital Partners, which owns almost 90 per cent of the company that manages real estate trust Japan Hotel Reit Investment Corp, aims to raise around 60 billion yen in its first yen-denominated fund.