Joel Ross Joel Ross

Only three of 50 economists got it right this month on their UK economy predictions for the third quarter. GDP grew 0.5%, versus the average prediction of 0.3% The UK has grown 0.6% over the past 60 years, so last quarter was pretty good proof that Brexit has so far not impacted their economy. Economists continue to predict problems in housing and employment, but at the moment that has not shown up. While it might, and probably to some degree will for a bit next year, I continue to believe the UK will get through this with nowhere near the damage predicted by many. We will know a lot more by next summer but until then, it is just speculation by everyone.

Just yesterday the EU was able to pressure Belgium to force the one holdout province to go along with the Canada trade deal. We don't know what concessions were made to the dairy farmers who were holding up the whole deal, but the fact that some farmers in Belgium had the power to derail such an agreement for the whole EU just magnifies the dysfunction of the group. There are nine more contentious trade deals lined up for approval so we will see if they get approved without similar resistance by others. There seems to be a rapidly growing realization by many that the EU is in real trouble.

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Joel Ross

Joel Ross began his career in Wall St as an investment banker in 1965, handling corporate advisory matters for a variety of clients. During the seventies he was CEO of North American operations for a UK based conglomerate, and sat on the parent company board. In 1981, he began his own firm handling leveraged buyouts, investment banking and real estate financing. In 1984 Ross began providing investment banking services and arranging financing for real estate transactions with his own firm, Ross Properties, Inc. In 1993 Ross and a partner, Lexington Mortgage, created the first Wall St hotel CMBS program in conjunction with Nomura. They went on to develop a similar CMBS program for another major Wall St investment bank and for five leading hotel companies. Lexington, in partnership with Mr. Ross established a hotel mortgage bank table funded by an investment bank, and making all CMBS hotel loans on their behalf. In 1999 he formed Citadel Realty Advisors as a successor to Ross Properties Corp., focusing on real estate investment banking in the US, UK and Paris. He has closed over $3.0 billion of financings for office, hotel, retail, land and multifamily projects. Ross is also a founder of Market Street Investors, a brownfield land development company, and has been involved in the acquisition of notes on defaulted loans and various REO assets in conjunction with several major investors. Ross was an adjunct professor in the graduate program at the NYU Hotel School. He is a member of Urban Land Institute and was a member of the leadership of his ULI council. In 1999, he conceived and co-authored with PricewaterhouseCoopers, the Hotel Mortgage Performance Report, a major study of hotel mortgage default rates.