SCPI funds: who bears the losses?

SCPI: measuring the risk, part 6 of 6. Research cut-off: 13 September 2026.

A French saver does not have to own an SCPI fund directly to feel its losses. In its second-quarter 2026 report, property investment vehicle Capimmo says that early auction prices for Primopierre units contributed to adjustments in its own valuation. Capimmo is distributed through life insurance. The secondary-market prices examined in Part 2 therefore matter beyond the investors who actually sold. This is the manager’s explanation; the available holdings information does not let us reproduce the precise financial impact independently. Source: Capimmo report, p. 1

A fund’s resale prices can therefore reach another saver’s policy statement. Tracing how far the effect travels requires following each party’s obligations. A property company, a fund, an insurance policy and a lender make different promises. The saver may bear a fall in investment value, the insurer may face a cash payment, and a bank may hold an outstanding loan. Those are not necessarily equal amounts, nor three additional losses to be added together.

The final instalment follows those promises. The first question is who bears the loss. The next is who must find the cash when the investor asks to leave.

How an SCPI reaches a life insurance policy

An SCPI is an unlisted French property investment company that holds real estate for its investors. A saver can own its units directly. Alternatively, a life insurance policy may offer a unit-linked investment option backed by a civil company, often called an SC or SCI, which in turn owns properties and fund units. The AMF explains that these companies can hold SCPIs, OPCI property funds and other civil companies. A policyholder investing through such an option does not become a member of the underlying civil company. Source: AMF

There is no universal chain. A policy may offer an SCPI-backed option without an intermediate SCI. A civil company may own buildings directly. Capimmo’s own product description sets out several ownership routes, including investments in funds managed by Praemia. Each portfolio needs to be traced rather than forced into a single diagram of the industry. Source: Praemia

The Capimmo disclosure establishes something narrower and more useful than a general claim of contagion: a price formed in the market for one fund’s units can affect another fund holding those units. It does not mean every Primopierre building has been marked down by the same percentage. Nor does it attribute all of Capimmo’s decline to Primopierre. The size of the holding, its valuation treatment and other portfolio changes must be separated. Source: Capimmo management commentary

A policy statement presents an investment value. Explaining how it moved may require looking through several layers of ownership. A long list of investment options does not, by itself, reveal whether the underlying properties are genuinely diversified.

What the insurer commits to paying

French assurance-vie can serve as an investment wrapper. For a unit-linked option, the policy’s euro value moves with the underlying investment. The insurer’s commitment concerns the number of units, not a fixed euro value. Market risk therefore sits with the policyholder, subject to any additional contractual guarantees. The word “insurance” does not protect the capital in every investment option. Source: ABE Infoservice

Capimmo’s product page makes both points: it attributes liquidity to the insurer while warning that capital is not protected and that property can be difficult to sell. Both features matter when reading the policy. Source: product presentation and risks

The distinction becomes operational when the saver requests a payment. Surrendering a policy and redeeming the fund units held behind it are different transactions. ABE Infoservice explains the general rule: the insurer has at most two months after receiving all the necessary documents to pay a surrender request. The contract may promise a shorter period. That rule is not a promise that the underlying properties can be sold within two months. Source: ABE Infoservice

The insurer may consequently have to pay before the underlying fund has redeemed its own units. The intervening cash requirement is a liquidity problem. It may be manageable for a diversified insurer. Measuring it requires the payments actually due, available liquid assets and the relevant obligations. Applying a property-price decline to the insurer’s entire balance sheet would mix different risks.

A lower unit value also reduces the obligation expressed in those units. The investment’s decline does not automatically become an equal loss of the insurer’s own capital. This reasoning does not eliminate liquidity costs or additional guarantees. It also does not describe a property investment held for the insurer’s own account, where risk is not passed through to a unit-linked policyholder in the same way.

There are exceptions to the ordinary payment timetable

The wrapper’s protections are not unlimited. Article L131-4 of the French Insurance Code provides for restrictions in specified circumstances involving suspended unit issuance or redemption, or temporary redemption caps in an underlying fund. The restrictions concern the affected portion of the policy, not automatically the whole contract. Policyholders and the ACPR must be informed; in the case covered by paragraph II, the supervisor can overturn the decision. These provisions can override ordinary settlement deadlines. Source: Insurance Code, L131-4, I–IV

An SCPI exit queue does not automatically trigger this mechanism. The underlying investment, the measure taken by the fund and the statutory conditions must be checked. We found no public confirmation in the documents reviewed that this provision had been activated affecting policies holding Capimmo. Its use needs to be established for the contracts concerned.

Direct ownership is different again. The AMF’s mediator has explained that a valid SCPI redemption request may have no determinate execution date. Merely holding those fund units does not entitle the investor to the payment timetable applicable to a separate insurance policy. Source: AMF, February 2024

The useful reading exercise is therefore contractual: who owes a payment, how is it valued, and what conditions apply? The underlying fund’s brochure does not replace the terms of the policy hosting it.

Cash must be available where the obligation falls due

Capimmo’s allocation at 3 July 2026 reports a 4.0% liquidity bucket, beside a chart showing a minimum target of 10%. The manager also reports more than €1.2 billion in cumulative disposals under a programme started in 2023, supporting investment commitments and withdrawals. That cumulative sales figure is not cash still available in July. Source: Capimmo report, p. 2

The difference between the allocation and the target calls for an explanation. It does not, on its own, establish a legal breach: the applicable definitions, exceptions and complete contractual documentation matter. Nor does it measure the insurer’s liquidity. A reserve percentage without a payment schedule and information about usable assets cannot tell us how long withdrawals can be met.

The same report supplies the material counterargument. Praemia judges liquidity sufficient to cover identified investment commitments over twenty-four months while continuing to repay withdrawal requests. This is the manager’s assessment, not an independently reproduced test covering every redemption scenario. Source: Capimmo report, p. 2

The AMF also distinguishes civil companies from SCPI and OPCI vehicles: the former do not receive the same AMF product approval. That does not mean their manager and insurer operate without supervision. It means the vehicle’s rules and the policy’s rules must be examined separately. Source: AMF

What sits inside banks’ €558 billion exposure

For banks, the starting dataset is different. The ACPR survey covering five major French banking groups reports €558 billion of broadly defined commercial real estate exposure at 31 December 2025. Its table separates €527.9 billion of lending exposures from €30.1 billion of own-account investments. Within the lending figure, €238.7 billion relates to property businesses. It is a subset, not another sum to add. Source: ACPR, Table 1, p. 4

The scope includes property used by non-property businesses and social housing. It extends beyond offices, SCPIs and properties located in France. Calling it a potential banking bill from SCPI funds would misidentify the underlying exposures. Source: ACPR survey scope

The same exposure is 6.5% of total banking assets and 134% of Common Equity Tier 1 capital, according to the ACPR table. CET1 is the highest-quality regulatory capital. The two denominators answer different questions: how much of the asset base is exposed, and how large the exposure is relative to a loss-absorbing resource. Neither ratio tells us how much will be lost. Source: ACPR, p. 4

Moving from an exposure to a loss estimate requires the borrower’s capacity to pay, collateral, creditor ranking and recoverable amounts. A lower appraisal can weaken collateral without immediately producing an equal loss for the lender. Conversely, a mortgage does not make a loan risk-free when both income and property values deteriorate.

The ACPR considers bank financing broadly resilient while highlighting vulnerabilities among property businesses. At end-2025, Stage 3 exposures were 3.4% across the credit portfolio considered and 4.2% for property businesses. Stage 3 under IFRS 9 is a credit-impaired classification. It does not mean those percentages of the portfolio have been irretrievably lost. Nor are these SCPI-specific rates. Source: ACPR summary

One property loss can appear in several portfolios

Fund statistics pose a related problem. At 30 June 2026, the ASPIM reports €86 billion of SCPI capitalisation, €20.3 billion of civil-company net assets and €10.5 billion of retail OPCI net assets. Adding these stocks would not produce a consolidated measure of property risk: the valuation measures differ, and some vehicles can hold units in others. Sources: ASPIM and AMF AMF

The same economic exposure can run through several reported investment values. A proper consolidation identifies ultimate holders, removes internal holdings and retains genuinely separate obligations. Without that exercise, one building, or one write-down, can be counted several times.

The intermediate layers still matter. Their charges, possible borrowing and payment dates may change losses and cash requirements. Consolidation should describe those effects, not assume them away.

Workshop: follow the losses and payments

The examples below are independent and use millions of euros. They exclude fees, taxes, additional guarantees and all assets or liabilities not specified. They illustrate economic identities, not complete insurance accounts, a stress test or a forecast for Capimmo.

1. A write-down passing through several layers

Assume a debt-free SCPI whose property value falls from 100 to 80. A civil company owns the whole SCPI and nothing else. An insurer owns the whole civil company to back unit-linked obligations, with no additional guarantee.

The underlying write-down is 20. It appears in the SCPI unit value, the civil company’s value and policyholders’ investment entitlements. These three observations do not create a loss of 60. The insurer holds an asset that has fallen in value, but its unit-linked obligation also falls in this simplified model.

Borrowing, different obligations or transactions at other prices would require a different calculation. The lesson is limited: do not add the same write-down at every ownership layer.

2. A solvent fund can still be short of cash

A fund holds 90 in illiquid investments and 10 in cash, with no debt. It must pay 15 in redemptions now. The immediate liquidity gap is 5. It is not a shortfall of 5 in the value of its assets.

If it sells an investment worth 5 for net proceeds of 5, it can pay the 15. Remaining investors then hold assets worth 85. The assumed sale creates no write-down. A discount, costs or a delay would change the result. The example establishes no redemption right in any actual fund.

3. Debt amplifies the decline for investors

A different vehicle owns property worth 100, financed by 40 of debt and 60 of net value. The property is marked down to 80, with debt unchanged at 40. Net value falls to 40, a decline of 33.3%.

The bank’s claim is not automatically cut by 20%. Repayment is not guaranteed, however: income, financing at maturity and any collateral realisation still matter. Accounting provisions and insolvency proceedings are not modelled.

When transmission could become amplification

A valuation decline becomes more dangerous when it forces asset sales. The ECB describes the mechanism for open-ended funds: withdrawals can lead to hurried disposals, sale prices affect valuations, and investors may respond with further withdrawals. Tools that limit or defer redemptions can interrupt that feedback. Its May 2026 analysis is a European modelling exercise, not a forecast for French SCPIs. Source: ECB

Applying the mechanism here requires several conditions to coincide. A fund must actually lack usable resources. Its sales must affect the pricing of comparable assets. Other owners must incorporate those references into their valuations or face the same underlying rental problems. Financing must then tighten or withdrawal pressure intensify. Several funds falling in value at the same time does not establish the whole chain.

SCPI queues and secondary markets alter that transmission. Where an exit remains pending, or a unit is sold to another investor, the fund need not sell a building to fund that particular transaction. Protecting the portfolio can therefore mean delay or a lower price for the departing investor. The cost sits elsewhere; it has not vanished. Source on SCPI redemption mechanics: AMF

Sector flows need equally careful interpretation. In the first half of 2026, retail OPCIs recorded €337 million of net outflows, civil companies offered as unit-linked options €265 million, while SCPIs still attracted €2.2 billion of net inflows. Both outflow categories improved against the previous half-year. For civil companies, however, outflows remained above the €101 million recorded in the first half of 2025. The comparison period changes the picture. These are flows, not investment losses. Source: ASPIM

Positive subscriptions across an industry do not automatically put money into its troubled funds. Yet rising outflows are not conclusive evidence of worsening stress either. The Banque de France reports that completed disposals and the lifting of some liquidity restrictions allowed more redemption requests to be paid at end-2025. This partly explained increased OPCI and SCI outflows between the third and fourth quarters. The measured flow can rise because investors are again able to receive their money. Source: Banque de France, printed p. 44, PDF p. 45

The limits of the available risk picture

The strongest counterweight to a claim of generalised crisis remains the Banque de France’s assessment published on 24 June 2026: commercial-property credit risk was contained. That is a financial-stability judgement, not certification of an SCPI’s resale price or an insurance option’s availability in September. Source: Banque de France

The documents establish that the manager describes a valuation effect running from Primopierre into a life-insurance investment vehicle. They also allow broad bank property exposure to be distinguished from SCPI lending. They do not establish a consolidated SCPI-related loss for insurers and banks, or show that a systemic crisis is underway. Sources: Capimmo and ACPR ACPR

The central missing input is a complete reconciliation of holdings by insurer: quantities, valuation conventions and allocation between unit-linked obligations, euro funds and own-account investments. That would need to be matched with payments due, restrictions actually in force and the bank financing associated with the relevant vehicles and subsidiaries. We did not find that consolidated table in the public sources used. This does not imply that supervisors lack it.

The most useful future evidence will be completed and settled property sales, fulfilled and outstanding withdrawal requests, usable reserves, payment dates and identifiable credit deterioration. Another cut in a unit price cannot substitute for those observations.

The series ends with a practical distinction. A saver can suffer a loss without a fund failing. An insurer can need cash without absorbing the full investment write-down. A bank can be exposed without having lost its claim. Additional danger arises when several of those constraints have to be resolved at once. That collision needs to be measured without counting the same billions repeatedly.

Method and sources

This investigation uses manager disclosures, ASPIM statistics, AMF and ACPR publications, Banque de France and ECB analysis, and insurance legislation. Manager assessments are attributed and do not constitute independent verification of their holdings. No interviews or requests for comment were conducted. The worked examples are fictional. This article is not a recommendation to buy or sell.

Observation dates differ: December 2025 banking exposures, first-half 2026 fund flows, Capimmo’s July allocation and documents consulted through 13 September. The AMF explainers were read in indexed text because direct access was blocked. Article L131-4 was checked on Légifrance; the displayed version has been in force since 11 December 2016. The Praemia, ACPR and Banque de France PDFs were checked directly.

The complete series

1. French SCPI funds: the misleading fall in exit queues
2. French SCPI funds: the price of getting out
3. SCPI: the income behind the yield
4. French office SCPI funds: the cost of empty space
5. French SCPI funds: when debt sets the timetable

Detailed references and scope

1. Praemia REIM France : SCI Capimmo : Reporting trimestriel T2 2026. Q2 report, observations at 3 July 2026. Pages 1–2: valuation, allocation and disposals. Manager disclosures; no independent holdings reconciliation.
2. Praemia REIM France : SCI Capimmo : présentation et risques. Product presentation and risks. Key figures dated 4 September do not replace the allocation lines in the July report.
3. AMF : Placements collectifs : investir dans une société civile détenant de l’immobilier. 20 November 2023 explainer on civil companies, policyholder status and product approval. Indexed text consulted; direct access blocked.
4. ABE Infoservice (Banque de France, ACPR, AMF) : Assurance-vie : comprendre les contrats et les supports financiers. Unit-linked obligations and risk of capital loss.
5. ABE Infoservice (Banque de France, ACPR, AMF) : Que faut-il savoir si vous avez conclu un contrat d’assurance vie ?. General surrender payment timetable after receipt of the necessary documents; statutory exceptions are treated separately.
6. Légifrance : Code des assurances : article L131-4. Article L131-4, paragraphs I–IV, in force since 11 December 2016. Conditions and restrictions on the affected policy portion.
7. AMF : Médiateur : SCPI : une demande de retrait, même régulière, peut être exécutée dans un délai indéterminé. 1 February 2024 mediator case on direct holdings. Indexed text consulted; insurance-specific exceptions must be read separately.
8. ASPIM / IEIF : Collecte et performance des fonds immobiliers grand public au premier semestre 2026. ASPIM/IEIF industry statistics: first-half 2026 flows and 30 June stocks. Different measures, with possible cross-holdings.
9. ACPR : Analyses et synthèses n°184 : Le financement de l’immobilier commercial par les banques françaises en 2025. Study No 184, completed 2 July 2026. Five groups, end-2025 exposures. Table 1 p. 4, credit risk p. 16, survey scope p. 22.
10. ACPR : N°184 : page de présentation. Study No 184 overview, updated 30 July 2026. Broad resilience and vulnerabilities among property businesses.
11. Banque de France : Rapport sur la stabilité financière : Juin 2026. Report published on 24 June 2026: the financial-stability assessment at that date.
12. Banque de France : Rapport sur la stabilité financière : Juin 2026, texte intégral. Printed p. 44, PDF p. 45: disposals, resumed redemptions and OPCI/SCI outflows at end-2025.
13. Banque centrale européenne : Assessing the macroprudential impact of liquidity management tools for investment funds: a system-wide analysis. May 2026 modelling analysis: fire sales and liquidity tools. Pre-emptive investor behaviour is outside the model; no estimates transferred to French SCPIs.