What Matters in EMEA Corporate Credit
European Retail Real Estate and UAE Property Developers: Recovery, Resilience and Credit Differentiation
Europe's leading retail landlords are benefiting from stronger operating performance, lower leverage and, in many cases, more disciplined financial policies. Meanwhile, UAE property developers continue to deliver solid operating results despite geopolitical uncertainty, supply chain disruptions and moderating market conditions.
Both sectors are navigating a higher interest rate environment that continues to influence property valuations, financing costs and refinancing activity.
Join us for a discussion of the credit trends, business model strengths and financial risks shaping the outlook for European retail real estate and UAE property developers.
Hear firsthand insights from Europe's largest retail landlord, Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield, through the perspective of its CFO, Fabrice Mouchel.
What will be discussed?
- How have stronger operating performance, deleveraging and disciplined financial policies improved credit quality among Europe's largest prime retail landlords, and can these trends continue in a higher-rate environment?
- Why are prime, experience-led and convenience-anchored retail assets outperforming secondary retail assets across the UK and continental Europe?
- What challenges remain, including pressure on interest coverage, higher refinancing costs and macroeconomic uncertainty, and which landlords are best positioned to navigate them?
- How are geopolitical uncertainty and supply chain disruptions affecting UAE property developers, and why do leading firms continue to report strong sales and project execution?
- How do large order backlogs, customer advances, equity-funded deposits and healthy margins support liquidity, and can these strengths be sustained if market activity slows?
- How might a more challenging operating environment differentiate established, financially disciplined developers from newer and less-tested issuers?
Speakers
Andrea Usai
Executive Director, Corporate Finance
Moody's Ratings
Ana Silva
Vice President - Senior Analyst, Corporate Finance
Moody's Ratings
Lisa Jaeger
Vice President - Corporate Finance
Moody's Ratings
Aziz Al Sammarai
Vice President, Corporate Finance
Moody's Ratings
Giulia Calcabrini
Assistant Vice President-Analyst, Corporate Finance
Moody's Ratings
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Andrea leads a team of London-based analysts within the corporate finance franchise covering a diverse portfolio of industries. Andrea started his career at Banca Intesa in Italy where he worked as a private banker, as a corporate banker and he also worked as an analyst at Bloomberg Financial Markets in London. Andrea was also a banking supervisor with the UK Financial Services Authority (FSA) for eight years. Andrea joined Moody’s in London 2011 and prior to his current role, he managed the Business & Consumer Services Team in New York for several years.
Ana Luz Silva Robles is a Vice President – Senior Analyst in Moody’s Corporate Finance Group. Based in Frankfurt, she is responsible for a portfolio of predominantly real estate issuers. Ana joined Moody’s in 2018 from Société Générale in Frankfurt, where she spent more than three years as a corporate credit analyst, covering large-cap and midcap names from the Real Estate, Chemicals and Healthcare industries. Prior to that, she spent nearly 2 years at Braskem Europe, as a credit risk manager of a wide customer base across diverse industries. Her career as credit analyst started in 2010 within the international corporate real estate arm of Commerzbank group in Mexico City and she was transferred to Germany in 2012 to oversee the Mexican commercial real estate portfolio. Ana has a Master’s degree in Finance from the Goethe University in Frankfurt and is a CFA Charter holder.
Lisa Jaeger is a Vice President – Ratings in Moody’s Corporate Finance Group based in Dubai. She is responsible for a diversified portfolio of issuers across the Middle East, Turkey and South Africa, including Investment Holding Companies and Conglomerates, Telecoms and Diversified Industrials. Lisa joined Moody’s in 2020 after spending 5 years at Goldman Sachs in London, where she was an Executive Director and senior credit risk manager, covering leveraged lending to corporates as well as real estate and structured finance lending and investing transactions. Prior to that, Lisa spent 6 years at J.P. Morgan in London, where she started her career with the bank’s credit risk graduate program in 2009, covering a wide range of different clients and products, including financial institutions, private equity sponsors and diversified investment grade and non-investment grade corporates. During her time at J.P. Morgan, she also spent one year in the leveraged finance origination team. Lisa holds a Master’s degree in Finance and Strategy from Sciences Po Paris. She speaks fluent English, German and French and is learning Arabic.
Aziz Al Sammarai joined Moody’s Corporate Finance in April, 2018. Aziz is based in Toronto office where he covers a portfolio of U.S. and Canadian based companies mainly in the paper and plastic packaging and forest products industry as well as Canadian based airlines and homebuilders. Prior to joining Moody’s, Aziz held multiple roles in the credit rating industry in Toronto. Previously, Aziz worked in external audit roles for KPMG.
Aziz has a Master’s in Finance from the Queen's University and a B.Sc. in Finance from the University of Bedfordshire Oman.
Giulia Calcabrini is an AVP-Analyst in Moody’s Corporate Finance Group.
Giulia holds a Bachelor’s Degree in International Management from the University of Warwick and a Master’s Degree in Risk and Finance from the London School of Economics.