Medical Properties Trust agreed to sell a 50 percent stake in a portfolio of eight Massachusetts hospitals to an infrastructure investment fund managed by Macquarie Asset Management.
Under the deal, Macquarie Infrastructure Partners V LP will purchase the eight hospitals, which currently are operated by Dallas-based Steward Health Care.
The portfolio of hospitals is valued at $1.78 billion, and the sale is expected to generate $1.3 billion in proceeds for Medical Properties Trust.
Medical Properties Trust said it plans to use the proceeds from the deal to pay off debt for the 18 behavioral health facilities it purchased in June.
"We are pleased to enter into this partnership with MPT," said Karl Kuchel, CEO of Macquarie Infrastructure Partners. "The eight hospitals that we are investing in are essential to their local communities and Steward, as operator, has clearly demonstrated the ability to transform the performance of these acute care hospitals over the last five years, so that they are now world class, well-operated healthcare infrastructure facilities."
The deal between the two parties is the first of its kind by an infrastructure investor in the U.S. hospital sector, according to the company's news release.