“What is Cyprus most known for?” a developer asked me when I started reporting on rumors that a Greek Cypriot investor was circling the Transamerica Pyramid earlier this year.
“Halloumi (opens in new tab),” I said.
Delicious, but wrong, said the developer, who works with international investors. Rather, the island country in the eastern Mediterranean Sea had more recently developed a reputation for becoming a haven for Russian oligarchs (opens in new tab) to launder money and avoid sanctions related to the war in Ukraine.
While Yoda PLC, the Cyprus firm that reached an agreement to buy San Francisco’s most recognizable skyscraper last month, has never been implicated or accused of such activities, the perception is nevertheless part of the skepticism it has to contend with as it enters the U.S. real estate market for the first time.
Real estate insiders polled by The Standard said they were surprised to see Cypriot money finance such a large deal, which, according to research firm Green Street (opens in new tab), is expected to close later this year at roughly $700 million. (The current owners spent more than $1 billion on purchasing and renovating their investment.)
San Francisco is no stranger to foreign investment. German, Canadian, Middle Eastern, and Asian firms have been investing in real estate here for decades. But Greece or Cyprus has never been high on the list of countries to fundraise from, real estate sources said. Yoda PLC’s deal changes that.
The company, founded in 2019, did not respond to requests for comment.
But since Yoda went public on the Cyprus Stock Exchange in 2022, public filings (opens in new tab) and news reports about its founder and largest shareholder, Ioannis Papalekas, a billionaire Greek real estate investor, shed some light on the company.
Source: Isaac Ceja/The Standard
What is Yoda PLC?
The Cyprus business is an investment holding company that operates across two main segments: hospitality (which includes real estate) and shipping. As of September, Yoda reported that it oversees nearly $4 billion in assets, with 22% funded by borrowed money.
Approximately 71% of the company’s asset value is tied up in hospitality and real estate. Its portfolio is anchored by the acquisition of the Swiss luxury real estate company Ultima Capital SA in December 2024. Yoda now has properties in Greece, Switzerland, France, Luxembourg, and Cyprus.
Its portfolio includes four hotels and resorts, 17 chalets and villas, 10 residential and commercial developments, and 21 office towers and other buildings.
On the shipping front, Yoda has a 29% stake in the Greek company Capital Clean Energy Carriers Corp., which owns and operates tankers carrying liquified natural gas for major energy companies. Yoda’s total investment in the company is more than $460 million. As of September, Yoda reported owning 52 vessels.
It also has more than $69 million in investments in technology companies, including health insurance startup Antidote Health, which has a partnership with Greek basketball star Giannis Antetokounmpo (opens in new tab).
“Our policy is very strict on maintaining a low leverage on our consolidated balance sheet, and we are always focused on actively managing debt by refinancing with lower interest rate loans,” Yoda CEO Alon Bar wrote in a letter to shareholders.
Bar is Israeli and has a computer science degree from Reichman University in Tel Aviv. In college, he majored in entrepreneurship through the school’s Sam Zell Program, which was founded and funded by the late American billionaire and real estate tycoon.
Who is its founder?
Papalekas owns more than 70% of Yoda PLC. Before starting the firm in Cyprus, the Greek billionaire built a profitable office portfolio in post-communist Romania in the early 2000s and took his real estate firm Globalworth public on the London Stock Exchange in 2013. He later sold his stake in that company to Czech billionaire Radovan Vitek (opens in new tab) for more than $300 million in 2020.
During that time, Papalekas founded Papaduck Investments Limited, which was later renamed to Yoda PLC when the company went public on the Cyprus Stock Exchange in 2022.
While he is not the operating CEO of the company, the 49-year-old Papalekas is its ultimate beneficiary. Being based in Cyprus allows Yoda to benefit from the country’s low corporate tax rates and access to European Union markets.
What is it going to do in SF?
Yoda PLC has yet to make any public statements about its plans for the Transamerica Pyramid, one of San Francisco’s premier office properties.
After it was purchased by a German consortium led by Michael Shvo in 2020, the property underwent a full-scale renovation that allowed its owners to attract some of the most well-heeled tenants in town. The building is said to be more than 80% leased, although some new tenants have yet to move in.
Even though the leases executed by Shvo and his team after their acquisition were purported to be the highest rents the city’s office market has ever seen, sources say they are laden with tenant concessions and costly remodel allowances.
The property that Yoda intends to purchase includes two other nearby office buildings located at 505 and 545 Sansome St., which are far less recognizable than the Pyramid and were marketed by the current owners as “more entry-level” offices with lower rents.
In what is a change of approach from the current ownership, Yoda last month established four separate affiliates for each building and the public park at the base of the Pyramid with the California secretary of state’s office. CEO Bar signed on behalf of each LLC and listed the companies’ mailing addresses at 1 New York Plaza in Manhattan.