Blackstone’s defaulted NYC office tower loan up for sale at a 50% discount

Published

1 year ago

January 19, 2024

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Blackstone defaulted on the $308 million mortgage on a Manhattan office tower more than a year ago — and the debt is now up for sale at a discount of more than 50%.

Special servicer Midland Loan Services was hired by brokerage Jones Lang LaSalle to sell Blackstone’s loan, which is backed by 1740 Broadway, a 26-story Art Deco-style tower between 55th and 56th streets, according to Bloomberg, citing people familiar with the matter.

JLL has packaged the debt into a commercial mortgage-backed security for $150 million, Bloomberg reported — a 51% discount.

Given the handsome discount the loan is getting, sources told the outlet that the building could be eligible for an office-to-residential conversion.

The skyscraper has been losing value since 2014, when the mortgage was originated and 1740 Broadway was appraised at $605 million, according to loan documents reviewed by Bloomberg.

At the time, Blackstone’s EQ — its US office portfolio company — had just bought the 600,000-square-foot property from real-estate investment trust Vornado. It was reportedly full of tenants paying below-market rents, with a source telling The Post that EQ “overpaid for the building by at least $100 million.”

The debt was sent to special servicing in March 2022, when Blackstone shocked the real-estate world by transferring a $308 million loan on the building.

How could one of the worlds biggest landlords quit on a relatively modest $308 million loan, after they spent a fortune on modernizing the building with a new lobby and restaurant? one observer mused to The Post at the time.

Blackstone ceased funding operating shortfalls at the building and stopped paying the mortgage as of March 2022, according to Bloomberg.

Midland, however, has yet to foreclose on the tower, though it’s unclear why.

We wrote this property off two years ago, and in the event a buyer is identified, we will work collaboratively to transfer the ownership, a Blackstone spokesperson told The Post.

Representatives for Midland Loan Services, JLL and Blackstone did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for comment.

As of September 2023, the occupancy at 1740 Broadway was a mere 7.4%, according to capital markets firm GlobalCapital.

The tower is just one of many empty office buildings scattered across New York City, which is in a so-called “urban doom loop” caused by an influx of working from home during the pandemic — a trend that has stuck despite return-to-office mandates.

The doom loop concept is defined by empty office towers, which destroy quality of life and eventually drive residents out.

In the Big Apple, occupancy has only bounced back to 48.4% since the pandemic.

At the start of 2020, however, office occupancy was a strong 90% — before it plummeted to 10% upon the outbreak of COVID-19.

After shouldering a wave of defaults from landlords, banks are sitting on as much as $160 million in losses on loans to the commercial real estate market, according to researchers from Columbia, Stanford, the University of Southern California and Northwestern, per aworking paper publishedby the National Bureau of Economic Research last month.

The grim findings support an earlier calculation by Morgan Stanley that showed lenders would need to negotiate more than $1.5 trillion of their commercial real estate portfolios by the end of 2025 in order to avert defaults.

Sports

Panthers-Hurricanes Game 5 preview: Can Carolina force another game?

Published

3 hours ago

May 28, 2025

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Panthers-Hurricanes Game 5 preview: Can Carolina force another game?

All signs pointed to the Florida Panthers finishing off the Carolina Hurricanes in Game 4, but the Canes kept the series rolling with a 3-0 win on Monday.

Will the Panthers finish the story in Game 5? Or will the Hurricanes send the festivities back to South Florida again?

Here are matchup notes heading into Wednesday’s Game 5 from ESPN Research, as well as betting intel from ESPN BET:

More on Game 4: Recap | Grades

Matchup notes

Florida Panthers at Carolina Hurricanes
Game 5 | 8 p.m. ET | TNT

The Panthers’ odds to win the series are now -1600, adjusted from -5000 heading into Game 4. The Hurricanes’ odds have shifted to +750 (adjusted from +1500) after their win. The Panthers’ odds to win the Cup are now +105 (previously -110), while the Canes’ are now +1800. Sergei Bobrovsky is the leading Conn Smythe candidate in this series at +200, followed by Aleksander Barkov (+800).

Game 4 was the Canes’ first win in the round since Game 7 of the 2006 Eastern Conference finals against the Buffalo Sabres, snapping a 15-game conference finals losing streak. It was the longest losing streak in NHL playoff history for a team in the round preceding the Stanley Cup Final. The Hurricanes are now 4-4 all-time in Game 4s when trailing 3-0 in a best-of-seven series.

Frederik Andersen made 20 saves for his fifth career playoff shutout, his second with the Hurricanes. He joins Cam Ward (four), Kevin Weekes (two) and Petr Mrazek (two) as goaltenders with multiple playoff shutouts in Whalers/Hurricanes Stanley Cup playoffs history.

Carolina’s Logan Stankoven scored playoff goal No. 5 in the second period. He joins Erik Cole (six in 2002) and Warren Foegele (five in 2019) as the only rookies in Whalers/Hurricanes history to score at least five goals in a single Stanley Cup playoffs year.

Sebastian Aho scored an empty-net goal in the third period, his 32nd career playoff tally. That extends his own franchise record for career goals in the Stanley Cup playoffs.

The Panthers were shut out for the second time this postseason; both games were at home — the other instance was Game 6 of the second-round series against the Toronto Maple Leafs.

Florida went 0-4 on the power play in Game 4, and the team is now 0-8 with the man advantage in the last two games of this series after going 4-for-5 in Games 1 and 2.

Though he hasn’t scored a goal in the past two games, Sam Bennett has a team-leading nine this postseason. That is two shy of the franchise record in a single playoff year, currently held by Matthew Tkachuk (2023) and Carter Verhaeghe (2024).

Scoring leaders

GP: 16 | G: 6 | A: 9

GP: 14 | G: 5 | A: 9

UK

Liverpool fan says his baby was flung 15ft in his pram and his partner run over during trophy parade

Published

3 hours ago

May 28, 2025

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Liverpool fan says his baby was flung 15ft in his pram and his partner run over during trophy parade

A father has told Sky News how his partner was driven over, and his baby son was flung 15ft in his pram, after they were hit by a vehicle during the Liverpool parade collision.

Daniel Everson, 36, had been with Sheree Aldridge and their five-month-old baby, Teddy, at Liverpool FC’s victory parade on Monday.

“The best day of my life turned into worst”, said Daniel, a lifelong fan of ‘The Reds’.

Daniel described the moment the car came towards him and his family.

“I tried to hold on to the front of the car and try and stop it, push it, do whatever I could [to stop it] from hitting my partner and my baby.

“Me and my partner were flat on the roof, on the bonnet… we were just both trying to hold on for dear life with Ted next to us.

“And my partner went under the wheels of the car, of the front of the car, and it rolled over her leg, and I just bounced off to the side, but my boy and his pram got bounced totally in the opposite direction – about 15ft down the road.

“As soon as that happened, I just started screaming for my partner, and I found her and I asked where Teddy was, and she didn’t know… and I found him and he was okay, thank God.

“He was in the road, in his pram, on his back, and I grabbed him. I chucked the pushchair to the side and I ran up to some paramedics with him.”

Daniel, from Telford, said he felt like he was in “hell” as he rushed back to find Sheree.

“I had to carry her up the road with four police officers holding her while she was screaming and crying. At that point, I didn’t know what was wrong with her, but I could see the injuries to her leg,” he explained.

Sheree, 36, is recovering at Aintree University Hospital after suffering muscle tissue damage. Daniel has been allowed to return home with Teddy after he was assessed at Alder Hey Children’s Hospital.

“I feel a lot of emotions right now. Upset, angry, traumatised. A lot of unanswered questions that need to be answered.

“To me, it just wasn’t handled properly – the situation with the car getting that far into the crowd, in my opinion, he should not have got anywhere near us.”

Merseyside Police have now been given more time to question a 53-year-old arrested after a car struck a crowd at Liverpool FC’s victory parade on Monday.

The suspect, who police have described as a white British man from the local area, is being held on suspicion of attempted murder, dangerous driving, and drug driving.

Police have said the extra time they have been given to question the suspect runs into Thursday.

Politics

Pakistan announces Bitcoin strategic reserve

Published

3 hours ago

May 28, 2025

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Pakistan announces Bitcoin strategic reserve

Bilal Bin Saqib, head of Pakistan’s crypto council, announced on May 28 that the country is moving to establish a strategic Bitcoin reserve.

Speaking at the Bitcoin 2025 conference in Las Vegas, Nevada, Saqib said the government of Pakistan followed the United States’ lead in establishing a Bitcoin strategic reserve and is embracing pro-crypto regulatory policies. The government official told the audience:

“Today is a very historic day. Today, I announce the Pakistani government is setting up its own government-led Bitcoin Strategic Reserve, and we want to thank the United States of America again because we were inspired by them.”

The announcement represents a significant departure from the government of Pakistan’s previous stance on cryptocurrencies, holding that crypto would never be legal in the country.

Pakistan’s shift reflects the broader trend of nation-states adopting pro-crypto policies following the regulatory shift in Washington, DC under the President Donald Trump administration.