Japanese Investment Bank Eyes Downsize From Worldwide Plaza

Another firm is poised to join the ranks of those downsizing and upgrade their Manhattan office footprints.

Japanese investment bank Nomura Holdings is looking to move offices and shed roughly 200,000 square feet in the process, Bloomberg reported. People familiar with the plans told the outlet the firm retained Cushman & Wakefield to help it look for a new space.

The bank in 2011 signed a 900,000-square-foot lease at Worldwide Plaza in Midtown, now owned by SL Green and RXR. Months after signing the lease, however, Nomura decided not to occupy at least 160,000 square feet, long before the pandemic set off downsizes and subleases across the city’s office market.

Nomura’s current footprint is about 700,000 square feet, but the Tokyo-based bank is seeking 500,000 square feet in its next office move. Its lease at Worldwide Plaza doesn’t expire for another decade, but it can exercise an option to leave in 2027.

Manhattan’s office market has made strides in its recovery from the onset of the pandemic, but improvements haven’t been equal across price points. CBRE data published in January show a rise in activity across spaces priced at or above $100 per square foot, where landlords draw tenants to their pricey properties with upgrades, perks or concessions.

One of last year’s largest office leases saw global audit and consulting firm KPMG agree to take 450,000 square feet at Brookfield Properties’ Two Manhattan West. While that’s a sizable chunk of space, it still represented a 40 percent reduction from the firm’s Manhattan office space.

The borough’s office market fared better in the first quarter than it did in the fourth quarter, with tenants leasing 7.4 million square feet in the first quarter, according to Colliers, a 49 percent boost from the previous quarter.

But the boost in activity was about the only promising measure from the period, when net absorption was negative 1.2 million square feet and average asking rents declined across the three tracked submarkets. Additionally, the vacancy rate climbed past 17 percent.

— Holden Walter-Warner