Michael Shvo
Photographer: Loren Elliott/Bloomberg
NYC Real Estate Binge Piles Pressure On a German Pension Plan
A Bavarian pension fund backed New York developer Michael Shvo. Now the relationship is under strain.
Michael Shvo and BVK were always an odd couple, the splashy Manhattan developer and the frugal German agency overseeing the retirement assets of 2.8 million people, from doctors and lawyers to stage workers and chimney sweeps.
Brought together by a former business partner in 2018, the Germans provided a deep source of funding. BVK was eager to expand into US commercial real estate, and Shvo held the key. Over a little more than two years, they and their partners committed billions of dollars to a portfolio of trophy assets such as the Coca-Cola building in New York and the iconic Transamerica Pyramid in San Francisco.