From the monthly archives:

December 2008

SL Green Cuts Dividend, Says Almost Time To Go Shopping

December 30, 2008

Add SL Green to the list of REITs cutting dividends. SLG, the largest owner and manager of commercial properties in New York City, cut its quarterly common stock dividend by 50%, to save capital for debt payments and investments. SL Green cut the payout to 37.5 cents per share, down from 78.75 cents. At least […]

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Hotel REITs Sink The REIT Ship

December 29, 2008

What happened? Just when you though it was safe to venture out, the REIT sector got hammered again, with many shares down 10% or more on Monday. Much of the reason for that related to the latest round of dividend cuts, this time from the Hotel REIT sector. Ashford Hospitality Trust Inc. (AHT), a hotel […]

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The Coming Bust In Commercial Real Estate: Why Developers Are Desperate For the Dole

December 23, 2008

Both Bloomberg and the Wall Street Journal published stories on Monday warning of increasing trouble in the land of commercial real estate. It’s going to be pretty bad, there’s no doubt about it. But why is it bad and who is it really going to hurt? The Bloomberg headline claimed defaults could triple, but how […]

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No Bottom In Commercial Real Estate Until 2010 – 2011

December 20, 2008

The good news is that the end is near, and I’m not talking about the rapture. Mercifully (unmercifully?), Moody’s said Friday that commercial real estate is going to get a whole lot worse before it gets better, but that it WILL get better. Unfortunately, that won’t be until 2010, at the earliest. For now, Moody’s […]

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Anthracite CDOs on Watch For Possible Downgrade

December 20, 2008

Moody’s went more negative on commercial real estate yesterday, and as a result they went even more negative on below-investment grade CMBS. I have written about the bullseye that is on Anthracite’s (AHR) controlling class chest before, and while AHR is well-managed and still enjoys tangible, substantive support from parent Blackrock, if you’re new to […]

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REIT Preferreds: NCT Says Location, Location, Location

December 19, 2008

Boy did I make a mistake, and it was with real money. When Wes Edens stopped bothering to show up for Newcastle’s earnings calls, I should have realized what was going on. Sure he had purchased a bunch of NCT stock earlier in 2007, but with whose money? He had taken Fortress public just a […]

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Dilutive Dividends: Coming to a REIT Near You!

December 19, 2008

With the capital markets offering financing in spasmodic fits of miserly insufficience, almost no capital intensive industry can escape the effects of this money mess. Few businesses are more exposed to the financial firestorm more than Mortgage REITS, which make money with old fashioned spread lending. They borrow at 5%, lend the proceeds out at […]

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Mortgage REIT CBRE Realty Finance Suspends Dividend

December 18, 2008

Mortgage REIT CBRE Realty Finance has been fatally stung by its aggressive commercial real estate loan origination activities, which began at the worst possible time: 2005. CRTYZ.OB hardly has a nice ring to it, but on November 7th, the New York Stock Exchange permanently de-listed CBF (CBRE Realty Finance) due to its inability to satisfy […]

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Is Commercial Real Estate Loan Performance Really Improving?

December 17, 2008

Believe it or not, there was some good news for the beleaguered Mortgage REIT sector last month. Fitch said that commercial real estate CDO loan delinquencies actually fell in November. Translation: commercial real estate loans backing the CDOs that many Mortgage REITs issued by the bucketful were actually performing better, on average, than they had […]

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Public Storage: Sold on Craig’s List!

December 17, 2008

Storage REITs were the best performing REIT sector in 2008, which isn’t saying much. Apparently, some people thought storage would be a recession-proof investment last year, but those people weren’t counting on a recession like this one. With the economy completely upside down, never mind in a recession, storage will likely be one the first […]

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