Street Sleuth: Big bet on the office sector; Blackstone's move to buy REIT is akin to its hotel strategy

A day after the private-equity firm announced it would buy Equity Office for $20 billion plus $16 billion in debt assumption, Equity Office's largest shareholder, Cohen & Steers, questioned whether the Chicago landlord was worth more. Jim Corl, Cohen & Steers's chief investment off...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inWall Street journal. Europe
Main Author Jennifer S. Forsyth, Janet Morrissey and Ryan Chittum
Format Newspaper Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Brussels Dow Jones & Company Inc 22.11.2006
EditionEurope
Subjects
Equity
REITs
Stock exchanges
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Summary:A day after the private-equity firm announced it would buy Equity Office for $20 billion plus $16 billion in debt assumption, Equity Office's largest shareholder, Cohen & Steers, questioned whether the Chicago landlord was worth more. Jim Corl, Cohen & Steers's chief investment officer, said the cost of buying all the properties in the company's portfolio would value it "in the $60 range." Sam Zell, Equity Office's chairman, said in an interview on Monday that Blackstone's bid was unsolicited. He said the stock market had "underpriced the value of this company" and that no effort was made to find other bidders. "We got what we considered to be a significant offer at a price that we considered to be very attractive, and responded accordingly," he said.
ISSN:0921-9986