Tonight:
4°c
Whatever happens to Minerva, the property company named after the Roman "goddess of 1000 works" will leave at least two monuments to its labours in the City.
Last week the business that began life in the late-Eighties property boom revealed a £187 million loss for the second half of 2008. Nevertheless, chairman Oliver Whitehead announced: "Our focus going forward will be on continuing the good progress on our landmark developments."
But the former chief executive of builder Alfred McAlpine admitted Minerva may breach loan covenants by June. This threat meant there was "a material uncertainty which may cast significant doubt on the group's ability to continue as a going concern".
These two statements are not mutually incompatible. For the money has already been raised and reserved for the two developments.
They are the 455,000 sq ft Walbrook building opposite Cannon Street station and the 560,000 sq ft St Botolph's development near Aldgate.
The frame of the bulbous ribbed block at Walbrook is pretty much complete. The offices will be finished by Skanska in December.
The same Swedish builder has much further to go at St Botolph's, where only the concrete liftshafts and a bit of steelwork is currently showing above the hoarding.
Not a single square foot of Walbrook has been let and less than 15% of St Botolph's has been reserved.
Minerva has been also been cursed by the gods lingering on the seven-acre Ram brewery site in Wandsworth, bought in 2006 for over £80 million. Last week the government stalled the one million sq ft redevelopment by calling in the plans for further inspection.
The City has pretty much written off Minerva as a result of fears over these three projects. The share price stood at 132p last summer just before a bid of 160p from a Dubai-based Limitless was withdrawn. The shares were 7p yesterday, less than one tenth of the net asset value per share of the business.
This may or may not come as welcome news to 76-year old South African businessman Natie Kirsh, who now owns 29% of Minerva.
On the one hand, Kirsh paid well over the current odds for the stake he began building last summer.
On the other, he could now buy the rest of a business which has properties valued at more than £500 million for under £10 million.
Minerva's founders, Sir David Garrard and Andrew Rosenfeld, must be relieved that they handed over control of the company to the current chief executive Salmaan Hasan in 2005, when the shares stood at over 300p.
Hasan, who is in his early forties, joined from Deutsche Postbank. Many expected the former financier to sell off the assets and break up the company. But no: Hasan negotiated the loans to build Walbrook and St Botolph's and vowed to turn Minerva from a property-owning company into a fully-fledged developer.
This no doubt felt like a good idea at the time. For obvious reasons it may not feel like a good idea now.
Vader's helmet hit by the crash
Cannon Street commuters will notice that right next door to the offices with no tenants, being built by Minerva, lies a whole City block of offices emptied of tenants. But don't expect much activity behind the dark green hoardings soon.
These dusty-windowed sixties blocks were supposed to be replaced by a fanciful confection dreamed up by French architect Jean Nouvel with the aid of Lord Norman Foster. The pair were hired by owner Legal & General.
In 2006 designs for four buildings totalling one million sq ft were submitted for the 3.7 acre site. The tallest, at 350 ft, had lightweight sculpted upper storeys designed to "float and shimmer against the sky". It was quickly dubbed Darth Vader's Helmet.
L&G sold the site to Spain's largest developer Metrovacesa for £240 million in September 2007. But the dark forces of recession meant the Spanish could not pay. They have now agreed an instalment plan and promise to hand over all the cash by 2010.
The building is being "redesigned to meet new market conditions", says Metrovacesa, which last week happily met its first HP payment, despite posting a huge loss.
Dithering that meant a quick decision to eject Wheeler
The brutal ousting on Monday of Brixton chief executive Tim Wheeler has been put down to three traits of the 49-year-old property company boss.
One, he never wore a tie (lack of respect). Two, he was rude to City folk (a mortal sin). Three, he could be a bit sharp with property agents. (Well, Tim, you could be, couldn't you?)
But the real sin, it seems, was to dither while his peer group at Hammerson, Land Securities, British Land and arch-rival Segro raised £2.5 billion between them in rights issues.
These four property companies also paid those nice City folk £106 million in fees.
That hesitancy saw Brixton's share price almost halve in a week and compelled the board to force Wheeler out.
He has been replaced by investment director Peter Dawson, 37, who everyone thinks is nice. However, there is no sentiment in the City. The company's share price is still on the floor.
Arsenal's flats goal proves tough
Not much has changed in the five months since a visit to the old Arsenal ground found the quadrangle of 655 flats pretty much uninhabited.
This week a few more lights burn at Highbury. Net curtains of a particularly repulsive design hang in one flat. Men are spreading dark topsoil on the once-sacred pitch to form a central garden.
Actually, one unseen thing has changed. On 28 September last year it was suggested here that Arsenal had made a bit of a muck of playing property developers.
Terrace rumours were printed suggesting that half the investors who paid deposits of 10%-20% were walking away from off-plan deals agreed at prices 20%-30% higher than today's shrunken values.
This suggestion miffed Arsenal mightily, who maintain this week that the number of purchasers who have walked away remains in "single figures".
But the club has now admitted that all is not well. Getting those who have put down a deposit to come up with the rest of the cash is proving very tough.
The hard facts were retailed by chairman Peter Hill-Wood this week, when the club reported profits of £24 million for the six months to November. That was from playing football. At the same time Hill-Wood admitted the club would need to renegotiate and extend a £133 million loan used to finance the Highbury development.
That is because only 186 of the flats have been sold, with contracts exchanged on another 116. Sixty remain unsold. What the club now faces is getting the cash from investors who put down deposits on nearly 300 flats on a development 100% ready for occupation in four months' time.
Has this put Arsenal off property development? Nope. On Wednesday permission to build 730 flats to the south of the new Emirates stadium was granted.
