Real Estate Daily News Buzz is designed to give news snippets to readers that our (yet to be award winning) editors thought you could use to start your day. They come from various business perspectives, real estate, government, the Fed, local news, and the stock markets to save you time. Here you will find the headlines and what the news buzz of the day will be.
Monday, the Dow Jones industrial average rose 165.22 points, or 0.9%, to 17,828.76. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index added 24.69 points, or 1.2%, to 2,104.05. The NASDAQ composite index rose 73.40 points, or 1.5%, to 5,127.15.
U.S. crude oil fell 45 cents to close at $46.14 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Brent crude, which is used to price international oils, slid 77 cents to $48.79 a barrel in London. In other energy trading, wholesale gasoline edged up 0.4 cent to $1.375 a gallon in New York, heating oil fell a penny to $1.507 a gallon and natural gas fell 6.5 cents to $2.256 per 1,000 cubic feet.
Dow Jones industrial average turns positive for the year - Stocks posted solid gains Monday, adding to last month’s big advances and pushing the Dow Jones industrial average into positive territory for 2015. Health care stocks were among the winners as drugmakers Pfizer and AbbVie climbed, while energy stocks rose sharply in a late-day rally. Earnings season is nearly through, and the stock market has recovered significantly as companies have reported somewhat better results than initially expected.
U.S. SEC Approves New Crowdfunding Rules “U.S. securities regulators approved new crowdfunding rules on Friday, allowing start-up companies to raise money from mom-and-pop investors over the internet. Private companies were previously allowed to solicit only accredited investors - those with a net worth of at least $1 million, excluding the value of their homes, or annual income of more than $200,000. The Securities and Exchange Commission voted 3 to 1 to approve the measure.” (Reuters)
Cushman Hit With Round of Layoffs “Cushman & Wakefield went through a round of layoffs last week that hit the marketing and research departments in what appears to be fallout from the merger with Chicago-based DTZ earlier this year, according to multiple sources. The cuts were national in scope, with as many as 250 employees affected across the country. Here in New York City, about 40 positions were cut, sources familiar with the matter said.” (The Real Deal)
Fed Gives Banks $120 Billion Reason to Give Up on NYC “Seven years after the financial crisis, the ripples are still being felt in big-bank New York. Last week, the Federal Reserve proposed rules that would require JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup and the like to hold an additional $120 billion on their books to absorb potential losses. The idea is to raise the banks' ‘total loss-absorbing capacity,’ as the Fed not so elegantly put it. JPMorgan would be required to have loss-absorbing capacity equal to 23.5% of its assets.” (Crain’s New York Business)
Peet’s to Acquire Majority Stake in Intelligentsia Coffee “Peet’s Coffee & Tea has signed an agreement to acquire a majority stake in the Intelligentsia Coffee roaster and retailer, the company said Friday, just weeks after announcing a deal to acquire Stumptown Coffee Roasters. Under the deal, Intelligentsia will continue to operate as a separate brand. The goal is to offer differentiated, craft-coffee brands with unique propositions to better capture that market, he said.” (Nation’s Restaurant News)
New York’s Tishman Family Turns to Real Estate Tech Startups “New York’s Tishman family has been a major player for more than a century through the ups and downs of real estate. Now one of the family’s main branches—the one that ran Tishman Realty & Construction for decades—also is getting a good feel for the ups and downs of real estate technology startups. Many of its real estate tech investments, including those in building motion detectors and new building materials, have paid off nicely over the years.” (Wall Street Journal)
Lionsgate Seeks to Build on its Library of Film Properties With Theme Parks “Three years ago, as the first ‘Hunger Games’ movie was breaking box-office records, Jon Feltheimer, the chief executive of Lions Gate Entertainment, asked his lieutenants to investigate ways to turn their hit movie into a Disneyland-style ride. Roller coasters and other rides based on the movies will anchor new theme parks in the United States and China.” (New York Times)
Abercrombie & Fitch And Gap Could Be Retail Losers This Holiday Season “Teen retail chain Abercrombie & Fitch and apparel giant Gap pander to different demographics of shoppers, but both companies are primarily mall-based retailers. They are therefore especially vulnerable to online rivals such as Amazon.com. Their respective stocks have something in common as well: Both stocks are down double digits year to date. Shares of Gap have plummeted more than 34% so far this year, followed by a 24% decline in shares of Abercrombie over the same period.” (The Motley Fool)
Legal Battle Over Mall Taxes Continues Following Recession “The City of Racine was ordered this summer to reassess Regency Mall’s 2009 property value. But the judge that issued that order may now end up having to determine a fair value for the property that year, and two other years, after the mall’s owner rejected the city’s reassessment in October. Any decision lowering the mall’s assessment would leave the city, and other taxing bodies like the Racine Unified School District, having to return tax dollars paid by the company in 2009, 2010, and 2011.” (The Journal Times)
How Soon Will We See 2008 Again? “Are we headed for an overactive fourth quarter? Or will things slow? That depends, in part, on who you ask. GlobeSt.com asked Seth Gadinsky, owner of Miami-based Gadinsky Real Estate, a retail real estate services and consultancy, co-founder of H3 Hospitality, a specialty retail and entertainment consulting firm for the hospitality sector, and co-principal of Vintage Real Estate Investment Fund, a commercial real estate investment fund, for his thoughts.” (GlobeSt.)
E coli in Northwest marks Chipotle’s 3rd outbreak this year — Chipotle closed 43 of its Pacific Northwest locations after the chain’s third foodborne illness this year sickened about two dozen people, prompting renewed scrutiny of a company that touts its use of fresh ingredients and farm-sourced fare. Cases of the bacterial illness were traced to six of the casual Mexican food restaurants, but the company voluntarily closed down all of its locations in Washington and the Portland, Oregon, area as a precaution as an investigation continues. Chipotle has faced other recent foodborne outbreaks: Salmonella linked to tomatoes sickened dozens of people in Minnesota beginning in August, and in California, norovirus sickened nearly 100 customers and employees at a Chipotle restaurant in Simi Valley in mid-August. (AP)
VW says it will co-operate amid latest cheating allegation — Volkswagen cheated a second time on emissions tests, programming about 10,000 cars with larger diesel engines to emit fewer pollutants during tests than in real-world driving, according to the U.S. government. The latest charges follow VW’s admission in September that it rigged emissions tests for four-cylinder diesel engines on 11 million cars worldwide. In a notice of violation sent to VW, EPA officials said the automaker “knew or should have known” that by employing the software, the cars were not in compliance with Clean Air Act emission standards. The company says no software was installed in the six-cylinder diesel engines that would change the emissions values “in any impermissible way.” (AP)
Visa to buy Visa Europe in deal that could exceed $23B -Payment processing giant Visa announced plans Monday to buy its sister company, Visa Europe, in a deal that could be worth more than $23 billion and would consolidate all of Visa’s operations worldwide. The deal would make the world’s largest payment processing company even larger. The two companies have more than 2.9 billion cards issued on its combined network, processing roughly 88 billion individual transactions a year. (AP)
California settles debt collection suit with JPMorgan Chase — One of the nation’s largest banks will pay $100 million to settle a California lawsuit alleging it used illegal methods to collect debts from more than 125,000 credit card holders, the state’s attorney general announced Monday. JPMorgan Chase & Co. will pay an estimated $10 million to consumers in California as part of a previously announced $50 million national agreement, and will pay another $50 million in penalties to the state to settle a 2013 lawsuit. It is agreeing to change practices that the state says violated California law and led the company to file thousands of debt collection lawsuits between 2008 and 2011. They include collecting incorrect amounts, selling bad credit card debt, and running what Attorney General Kamala Harris’ office calls a debt collection mill that “robo-signed” court documents. (AP)
US factories grow at slowest pace in 2 1/2 years; hiring falls — U.S. factory activity grew last month at its slowest pace since 2013 as manufacturers pared their stockpiles and cut jobs. The Institute for Supply Management said Monday that its index of factory activity slipped to 50.1 in October from 50.2 in September. The figures barely signal growth, which is any reading above 50. U.S. manufacturers have been squeezed this year as a strong dollar and weak economies in China and other key foreign markets have cut into exports. A high dollar makes U.S. goods pricier overseas while lowering prices for imports that compete with American products. (AP)
US construction spending rises 0.6 per cent in September — U.S. construction spending rose 0.6 per cent in September to the highest level since March 2008, pushed up by a surge in apartment building. The Commerce Department said Monday that spending on construction rose to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $1.09 trillion. Construction of apartments and condominiums jumped 4.9 per cent in September from August, while construction of single-family homes rose 1.3 per cent. Overall, private residential construction rose to the highest level since January 2008. (AP)