Brussels Airport ownership in focus amid Canadian fund’s £10 billion asset sale

The Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan (OTPP) is reportedly selling its stakes in major airports, including Brussels, Copenhagen, Birmingham, Bristol, and London City, to capitalise on post-Covid travel recovery.

The portfolio, valued at over £10bn, has attracted interest from minority shareholders and external bidders like Macquarie. The sale reflects a growing investor appetite for infrastructure assets as global air travel rebounds.

OTPP holds stakes ranging from 25% to 70% in each airport, and in particular 29% of te shares and 39% of the voting rights in Brussels Airport. However, the fund has had to endure the absence of dividends since 2019 at Brussels Airport, first to help the airport face the pandemic and now to “strengthen the financial structure of the company“.

OTTP is one of the main shareholders of the BAISA consortium, which owns 75% of Brussels Airport Company, together with the Belgian State owns 25% through the Federal Participation and Investment Company. The other shareholders of BAISA are the Dutch pension fund APG and the Australian investor QIC. The insurer Swiss Life and a Flemish consortium around the public investor PMV are also part of it.