Posts for Ticker ‘SLG’

Can Office & Retail REITs Stave Off The Economy? (GGP, KRC, DDR, SLG)

Office_building_picMany REITs are in trouble.  That is becoming the understatement of the year.  The REITs doing better in today’s environment are the ones whose projects are already built and those that were fully leased.  This is particularly true of retail and office REIT structures where investors are starting to become more risk adverse.

General Growth Properties, Inc. (NYSE: GGP) has been among the worst performers of retail and multi-use REITs.  Last week was deemed by many as the apex but that didn’t hold.  The company has secured additional funding in recent weeks, but is still back in the barrel.  Financing needs apparently still prevail and last week executives had to sell shares to cover margin calls.  Now, it is reviewing strategic alternatives and shares are down again.  In summer these shares were north of $40.00 and in the first half of 2007 this was a $60+ stock. On September 12, this was at $27.55.  Last week it closed as low as $19.92 before Friday’s recovery.  Shares today are down 17% at $17.70.

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Stifel Nicolaus Slashes REIT Ratings

The brokerage and research firm Stifel Nicolaus has decided that REITS are either at or are close to their inflection points.  REITs have been very strong performers in light of many large mergers, although they have already taken a decent breather in the last two weeks or so as the pace of mergers in the group has quieted down.

Most of the analyst ratings out of Stifel Nicolaus today are a downgrade from “BUY” to “HOLD.”  Here is a partial list of the liquid REIT stocks that saw downgrades today:

American Financial Realty Trust (AFR), Boston Properties (BXP), Brookfield Properties (BPO), BRT Realty Trust (BRT), Capital Trust (CT), Cedar Shopping Centers (CDR), Highwoods Properties (HIW), KIMCO Realty (KIM), Kite Realty (KRG), Newcastle Investment Corp. (NCT), Northstar Realty (NRF), ProLogis (PLD), Quadra Realty (QRR), Simon Properties (SPG), SL Green Realty (SLG), Washington REIT (WRE), Weingarten Realty (WRI). 

Jon C. Ogg
Jun 11, 2007

Jon Ogg can be reached at jonogg@247wallst.com; he does not own securities in the companies he covers.