Mayfair Capital Investment Management has appointed Amirali Kasraie to run the Swiss Life European Thematic Income and Growth fund.

Kasraie joins from Patrizia, formerly Rockspring Property Investment Managers, and has worked as fund manager on several pan-European funds over the span of his 16 year career at the firm.

In his new role, Kasraie will oversee and run the TIGR fund, with backing from Swiss Life, which owns Mayfair Capital Management.

The latter is a dedicated real estate investment firm and said "within a rapidly evolving market environment for European real estate, TIGR employs a diversified core/core plus strategy and benefits from market-leading resources and local expertise across the continent".

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Giles King, chief executive officer at Mayfair Capital, said: "Amirali has a deep knowledge of the industry and brings a wealth of experience to help advance the TIGR strategy. 

"Swiss Life is well-positioned to deliver a compelling proposition for investors entering or expanding into the European real estate market."

He added that he "looks forward to working with Kasraie as we seek to build on Swiss Life's 120-year real estate investment heritage."

Kasraie echoed these positive sentiments, saying he was looking forward to "building on TIGR's strong foundations and advancing the strategy over the coming years".

He acknowledged that this was an "undoubtedly entering a challenging period for European real estate", with the backdrop of a likely recession across the bloc and open war in Ukraine, but he was optimistic about the portfolios' resilience.

Kasraie described it as "well placed to deliver robust risk-adjusted returns for our investors".

He added: "At a time when yields are softening materially, the relative infancy of TIGR provides us with a distinct competitive advantage to focus on rapidly evolving occupier trends.

"As we continue to grow and diversify the vehicle across various countries and sectors, thorough assessment of fundamentals and ESG criteria on a case-by-case basis will be more crucial than ever before to generate long-term, sustainable value."