Real estate

Brockton Capital has added Birmingham's The Mailbox retail complex to its portfolio for £127.1m.

CANADA - Canada Pension Plan Investment Board has agreed to buy a 50% stake in Europe's largest retail complex, CentrO near Dusseldorf, Germany, for about €700m ($949m), according to three people with knowledge of the transaction.

UK institutional pension funds' equity allocation has plummeted by a fifth in the past decade - but remains the highest in the world, according to a global study.

EUROPE - Plans by the European Union to introduce Solvency II- type regulations to the pensions industry could hinder investments in real estate, delegates at the European Association for Investors in Non-listed Real Estate Vehicles (INREV) seminar heard....

Demographic changes, the ongoing pensions crisis and increasing regulation are the main challenges facing the global real estate market, delegates heard.

EUROPE - The global real estate crisis has created investment opportunities for pension funds and other institutional investors, Mercer believes.

US - California Public Employees Retirement System (CalPERS) saw its investments rise 13.3% in the year to June, beating its estimated return by almost two percentage points.

Property will face a tough second half of the year as fiscal austerity measures hit investment returns, ING REIM chief executive Kevin Aitchison warns.

GLOBAL - Expectations for average total property returns are falling sharply around the globe as economic uncertainty, reduced access to financing and increased supply take their toll, research has warned.

This month the panellists discuss the pace of recovery in UK real estate, and the reasons behind a possible stalling in the market