CLEVELAND—Shares of Forest City Realty Trust were up Wednesday after Bloomberg News reported that the REIT was in discussions with Brookfield Asset Management about a possible acquisition. A spokesman for FCRT tells GlobeSt.com the company has no comment; requests to Brookfield for comment had not received a response by early Wednesday afternoon.
Citing people said to be familiar with the discussions, Bloomberg reported that the talks were ongoing and might fail to lead to an agreement. Other bidders may yet emerge for FCRT, Bloomberg reported.
The REIT's share price Wednesday morning would give it a market value of about $6.4 billion. Bloomberg reported that the purchase price under discussion wasn't meaningfully higher than that, although the valuation could still change.
FCRT said this past September that it had begun reviewing its strategic options, including a merger or sale of the company. The Cleveland-based office, residential and retail owner/developer, which began trading as a REIT in January 2016, said at the time that there was no guarantee that the review would lead to a transaction of any kind.
“The board believes thoroughly evaluating all alternatives, while simultaneously continuing to execute on our current strategies and supporting our associates in doing so, are the appropriate steps to assess how best to unlock stockholder value,” James A. Ratner, non-executive chairman of FCRT's board, said in September. Over the past several years, he added, “we have made substantial progress transforming Forest City by focusing on core urban markets and products, reducing complexity, paying down debt, driving operational excellence and enhancing our corporate governance structure.”
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Paul Bubny
Paul Bubny is managing editor of Real Estate Forum and GlobeSt.com. He has been reporting on business since 1988 and on commercial real estate since 2007. He is based at ALM Real Estate Media Group's offices in New York City.
