> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.lacaribenanews.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Trinidad Bought the Hilton Company in September and Announced Its Sale in October. It Has Not Said What It Paid. - URL: https://www.lacaribenanews.com/hilton-trinidad-state-bought-september-selling-october-price-undisclosed-2026/ - Published: 2026-10-28T19:20:23.000Z - Updated: 2026-11-01T05:19:46.000Z - Description: eTecK acquired all shares of Hilton International Trinidad Limited on 4 September 2026, renaming it HotelTT Asset Management Company Limited. Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar announced a divestment on 13 October. No price has been disclosed, and Hilton manages on a six-month agreement. - Author: Theon Alleyne - Tags: Trinidad and Tobago, Tourism, Business, Analysis, Disclosure **Quick summary:** eTecK acquired all shares of Hilton International Trinidad Limited on 4 September 2026, renaming it HotelTT Asset Management Company Limited. Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar announced a divestment on 13 October. No price has been disclosed, and Hilton manages on a six-month agreement. By LCN Business Desk Anyone invited to bid for the Hilton Trinidad will be bidding on an asset whose price to the State is not public, whose manager is on a six-month contract, and which needs more capital than it is carried at. ## What did the State buy? The whole company, six weeks before deciding to sell the hotel. On **4 September 2026** the state agency **eTecK** announced it had acquired all the shares of **Hilton International Trinidad Limited**, renaming it **HotelTT Asset Management Company Limited** as a wholly owned subsidiary. The State also signed a **Deed of Surrender** ending the previous lease. Then on **Tuesday 13 October**, at a sod-turning for a Marriott-branded resort at Rocky Point, Mt Irvine in Tobago, Prime Minister **Kamla Persad-Bissessar** said: "Why is a government running a hotel?" She added: "We also intend to do a divestment process for the Hilton hotel." The two events sit 39 days apart. The State took full ownership of the operating company, then announced that owning it was not the business of government. ## What has not been disclosed? The price, the fees and the buyer. No purchase price has been published for the September share acquisition. No figure has been published for what Hilton is paid to manage the property. No buyer or sale price has been named for the divestment, and no date has been given for when expressions of interest open. That is three unpriced legs of the same transaction, and it is the condition in which a bidder is being asked to prepare. ## Who is asking about it? A property analyst, publicly, with a specific question about what was bought. **Afra Raymond** has put the point in the form that matters: "Given that the State already owned that land, the buildings and all the fixtures & fittings," what exactly was paid for, and "What price did we pay for those assets?" He has also asked "Why is the responsible Minister, Saddam Hosein, being so ambiguous about this transaction?", called for the financial statements to be released, opposed major new spending ahead of a sale, and said: "It is very important to obtain an Independent Valuation of the Trinidad Hilton." The question is not rhetorical. If the land, buildings, fixtures and fittings were already the State's, the thing acquired on 4 September was a company holding a leasehold interest and an operating business, and what that is worth is the whole question a price would have answered. ## What is the asset? A 405-room hotel carried at TT$274 million, which lost money last year. | The Hilton Trinidad, as reported | Figure | | ---------------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------- | | Rooms, per Hilton's February 2026 filing | **405** | | Carrying value, eTecK's 2023 audited accounts | **TT$274m**, from TT$259m in 2022 | | eTecK's income **from** the hotel, 2023 | **TT$9.317m**, from TT$12.269m in 2022 | | Result, 2025 | **TT$1.6m loss** | | Profitable years, 2016 to 2025 | **six of ten** | | Capital investment the minister says is needed | **about TT$400m** | Sources: eTecK's 2023 audited accounts and ministerial statements, as reported by the Trinidad Guardian and CNC3 on 24 and 25 October 2026\. Hilton's room count is from its own February 2026 filing. One line in that table is routinely misread and should not be. The TT$9.317 million is **eTecK's income from the hotel**, which both reports state explicitly. It is not the hotel's turnover and not its profit. ## What would a buyer have to spend? About half as much again as the building is carried at. Minister **Saddam Hosein** put the capital investment required at about TT$400 million. Against a carrying value of TT$274 million, that is roughly **46 per cent more than the asset's own book value**, on this newspaper's arithmetic from the two figures. The State's own recent spending has been falling. The Hilton Property Improvement Plan spent **TT$47.11 million** in fiscal 2024\. The 2025 allocation was revised **from TT$163.6 million to TT$3.6 million**, a cut of about **98 per cent** on the same arithmetic. The 2026 programme was allocated TT$10 million, of which TT$3.6 million is reported disbursed. An earlier refurbishment had spent **TT$508 million** by April 2016, on an estimate that rose from TT$484 million to TT$634 million. So the sequence a bidder inherits is a large completed refurbishment that overran, an improvement budget cut by almost everything in the year before the sale decision, and a stated capital requirement larger than the carrying value. ## Who runs the hotel in the meantime? Hilton, on six months. Hilton said: "It is business as usual for Hilton Trinidad & Conference Centre." It continues to manage the property under a recently signed agreement and directed further questions about the sale "to ownership". That agreement runs **six months, with a possible six-month extension subject to agreement**. Hilton handles daily operations and the State retains ownership. The term is the part a buyer reads twice. A brand-management agreement of six months, extendable once, is shorter than most divestment processes take from expressions of interest to completion. What a purchaser acquires may therefore be a hotel with a flag on it, or a hotel whose flag is up for renegotiation, and which of those it is depends on timing nobody has published. ## How does this compare with a divestment that published its numbers? Portugal named the price, the valuation and the margin over the losing bid. [Portugal selected Deutsche Lufthansa on 14 October 2026 to take 44.9 per cent of TAP Air Portugal for €1.2 billion over a rival bid from Air France-KLM, with Prime Minister Luís Montenegro saying the winning proposal was 16 per cent higher and valued TAP at €2.55 billion, while the state keeps 50.1 per cent](https://www.lacaribenanews.com/tap-lufthansa-stake-portugal-brazil-network-flag-carrier-2026/). That is a state divestment of a flag asset, announced the day after the Trinidad statement, in which the government put the consideration, the implied valuation and the comparison with the unsuccessful bidder on the record at the point of selection. The contrast is not that one country is virtuous. It is that a published valuation is what allows anyone outside the process to judge whether the state sold well, and Trinidad has not published one for either the purchase or the intended sale. ## Is this the regional direction? No. The week's other hotel decision runs the opposite way. [Antigua and Barbuda's Cabinet was to decide on Wednesday 28 October whether to draw up to $60 million from the Treasury, State Insurance, Social Security and the Airport Authority for two new 150-room hotels, with neither the instrument nor the return specified](https://www.lacaribenanews.com/antigua-cabinet-60-million-public-funds-two-new-hotels-2026/). Trinidad is on its way out of hotel ownership. Antigua is weighing its way in, with public money drawn from four sources. Neither has published the return it expects. Undisclosed terms are not confined to state transactions either. [Royal Caribbean reported its US$3.0 billion purchase of half of Sandals and Beaches Resorts in a Form 8-K of four sentences and filed none of the agreements as exhibits](https://www.lacaribenanews.com/royal-caribbean-sandals-agreements-not-filed-10q-due-2026/). ## What is settled, and what is not? The sequence and the figures are settled. The money is not. The September acquisition, the renaming, the Deed of Surrender, the Prime Minister's statement and its date, Hilton's statement, the six-month term and the figures in the table are each carried independently by the Trinidad Guardian, in a piece by Elizabeth Gonzales published on 25 October 2026, and by CNC3\. Afra Raymond's questions are his own, made publicly. Not established: what the State paid on 4 September; what Hilton is paid; whether any independent valuation exists or has been commissioned; whether the six-month agreement has been or will be extended; the hotel's own audited revenue and profit, as distinct from eTecK's income line; and when expressions of interest open. Neither report gives an employee count. One further bound belongs with the figures. Both reports print bare dollar signs. They are read here as Trinidad and Tobago dollars, which is the convention in Trinidadian reporting and the only reading consistent with scale, since TT$274 million for a 405-room hotel is about US$40 million while the same figure in United States dollars would be about US$676,000 a room. A government that has just bought a company in order to sell the hotel it operates has set itself one test it can still pass. It can publish what it paid before it asks anyone what they will pay. ### The entities - **eTecK**, the Evolving TecKnologies and Enterprise Development Company, is the Trinidad and Tobago state agency that acquired the shares. - **Hilton International Trinidad Limited** was renamed **HotelTT Asset Management Company Limited** on acquisition. - **Hilton Trinidad & Conference Centre** is the 405-room hotel at St Ann's that Hilton continues to manage. - **Kamla Persad-Bissessar** is the Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago. - **Saddam Hosein** is the minister responsible, who put the capital requirement at about TT$400 million. - **Afra Raymond** is the property analyst who has publicly questioned the transaction and called for an independent valuation. - **Deed of Surrender** is the instrument by which the previous lease was ended. - **Hilton Property Improvement Plan** is the state programme under which refurbishment money is allocated. ### What the title card shows Every data point on the article's title card, in text. - **4 September 2026.** When eTecK acquired all shares of Hilton International Trinidad Limited. - **13 October 2026.** When the Prime Minister announced the divestment. - **405.** Rooms at the hotel, per Hilton's February 2026 filing. - **TT$274 million.** The carrying value in eTecK's 2023 audited accounts. - **About TT$400 million.** The capital investment the minister says is needed, about 46 per cent more than the carrying value on this newspaper's arithmetic. - **Six months.** The term of Hilton's management agreement, with a possible six-month extension. - **No price.** What has been published for the September acquisition. ## Frequently Asked Questions ### What did the Trinidad and Tobago State buy in September 2026? On 4 September 2026 eTecK announced it had acquired all the shares of Hilton International Trinidad Limited, renaming it HotelTT Asset Management Company Limited as a wholly owned subsidiary, and the State signed a Deed of Surrender ending the previous lease. No purchase price has been disclosed. ### Who announced the sale of the Hilton Trinidad? Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar, on Tuesday 13 October 2026, at a sod-turning for a Marriott-branded resort at Rocky Point, Mt Irvine in Tobago. She said "Why is a government running a hotel?" and "We also intend to do a divestment process for the Hilton hotel." ### Is Hilton still running the hotel? Yes. Hilton said "It is business as usual for Hilton Trinidad & Conference Centre" and continues to manage the property under a recently signed agreement running six months, with a possible six-month extension subject to agreement. The State retains ownership. ### What is the hotel worth and what does it need? eTecK's 2023 audited accounts put the carrying value at TT$274 million, up from TT$259 million in 2022\. Minister Saddam Hosein put the capital investment needed at about TT$400 million, which is roughly 46 per cent more than that carrying value on this newspaper's arithmetic. ### Has the hotel been profitable? It recorded a TT$1.6 million loss in 2025 after profits in 2023 and 2024, and media reports put it in profit in six of the ten years from 2016 to 2025\. eTecK's income from the hotel was TT$9.317 million in 2023, down from TT$12.269 million in 2022, which is the agency's income from the property rather than the hotel's own turnover or profit. ### What has not been made public? The price paid for the shares in September, the fees payable to Hilton, any independent valuation, the hotel's own audited revenue and profit, and the date expressions of interest open. Property analyst Afra Raymond has asked what the State paid given it already owned the land, buildings and fixtures, and has called for an independent valuation.