The great Reit fire sale – where to find the best value© Getty Images

The real-estate investment trust (Reit) segment of the UK equity market has been on life support for much of the past five years, and it’s easy to understand why investors have decided to give the sector such a wide berth.

Reits are a diverse bunch and in reality many were able to navigate through these challenges without too much difficulty. But investors didn’t wait around. The sector’s difficult outlook, coupled with investors’ general desire to sell anything listed in London, heaped selling pressure on the shares.

Investors have continued to avoid the sector despite a general recovery in the market, even though it’s becoming desperately clear the sector is deeply undervalued. That’s a fair statement to make as it is easier to determine the underlying value of Reits than of most other companies.

Determining what Reits are worth

Investors can either use the published net asset values, or use yield as a proxy for underlying cash flow to determine the value of Reits. A combination of both is probably the best strategy.

This is where the yield comes into play. The vast majority of the total return from real estate over multiple decades is income. The value of the property can rise and fall, but the income is always there, so understanding how much income an asset can generate and the quality of that income is key. This in turn feeds back into the valuation of any asset.

Purpose-built properties with high-quality tenants on long-term inflation-linked leases are generally going to be worth much more (and maintain their value better) than smaller properties let to small shops on short-term leases.

Two-thirds of the group’s portfolio consists of industrial assets such as Parkbury industrial estate – occupancy here is 99% and demand for the space is so high that tenants are paying up to stay. It was able to push through rent rises of between 8% and nearly 40% last year, in situations where leases were coming up for renewal.

Despite these quality income streams, the trust is trading at a deep discount to its 100p per share net asset and buyers are taking notice. Over the past few years, Picton has sold a clutch of office properties at an average premium to book value of 5% and these weren’t even the company’s best assets. Picton now finds itself in a strange position.

It has an attractive portfolio of real estate generating attractive income streams that buyers are willing to pay a premium for and its gearing is low at 24%, with debt fixed at an interest rate of 3.7%, but the market doesn’t seem interested. One group of buyers, however, is taking notice.

Private equity pricks up its ears

Equity investors might not be interested in UK Reits, but corporate and private-equity buyers are both taking advantage of the opportunity. In mid-2022, there were 73 real-estate companies listed on the London Stock Exchange, according to figures compiled by the Association of Investment Companies (AIC).

In the three years since, 17 have been lost to mergers or deals that have taken the companies private; 14 have wound up or are winding up, or have put themselves up for sale, leaving just 42 listed companies – a decline of 42%.

Some of the sector’s largest players have moved to swallow up their smaller peers. The synergies achieved from any deal are usually relatively small in comparison to the values involved. Instead, Reits are seeking scale to fend off predators and reduce their cost of capital, as well as to appeal to a larger audience of investors.

Take LondonMetric (LSE: LMP). In the past three years, it has acquired three other Reits, including LXi Reit, Urban Logistics Reit and CT Property Trust. The deals have catapulted the trust into the FTSE 100, making it one of the UK’s largest corporate owners of UK real-estate property assets.

However, questions are now growing around the trust’s exposure to Merlin Entertainments, the private-equity-backed theme park operator. Merlin’s losses are spiralling, and 10% of LondonMetric’s rent roll is tied to its theme park assets. The market is watching this situation closely.

The other major consolidation deal in the sector this year was Primary Health Properties’ £1.8 billion acquisition of Assura. PHP outbid private-equity giant KKR and, assuming the merger clears the recently announced competition investigation, the deal will create a healthcare-focused behemoth with nearly £3 billion of assets.

Between them, the two groups generated rental income of £333 million last year, close to 85% of which is underpinned by revenues from the UK and Irish governments.

Private equity failed to crash PHP’s party, but that was the exception, not the rule. At the beginning of September, Blackstone emerged victorious in a months-long battle to take over Warehouse Reit after rival bidder Tritax Big Box Reit (LSE: BBOX) withdrew its offer.

Meanwhile, KKR has been in talks with build-to-rent provider PRS Reit, although PRS has now accepted an offer from another bidder. PRS owns the largest build-to-rent single-family home portfolio in the UK, with 5,443 completed homes as of 31 March 2025. The company put itself up for sale earlier this year following a strategic review.

PRS is a case study in what’s gone wrong in the UK market. Despite reporting near-full occupancy quarter after quarter, a consistent rent-collection rate of 100% and a steady dividend yield of 4%-5%, the stock has continued to trade at a discount of 20%-40% of the group’s net asset value.

Soon after it put itself up for sale, an offer emerged from Long Harbour (a property management firm) valuing it at 115p, or £631.6 million, around its current share price at the time, but still below the NAV at the end of December of 139.6p. In mid-September, the company announced it had agreed the sale of the PRS Reit Holding Company, its operating subsidiary that holds the entirety of the Reits portfolio of property assets for Waypoint Asset Management for £633.3 million after fees.

The company has said when the deal closes it will liquidate and return assets to shareholders as fast as possible.

Year-to-date, the Reit sector has traded at an average discount to NAV of 28%, while many buyout offers have come much closer to NAV. Such deals help justify the NAVs: they show the values presented are not overinflated or unrealistic. They are, in fact, an excellent gauge of what the private market is willing to pay for these assets.

They also show the vast gulf between private- and public-market views of the sector and its underlying assets. This suggests there’s an opportunity for investors who are willing to dig into the weeds to find the assets worth paying for in the sector.

Where to find the best value

As noted above, investors need to consider both the quality of a company’s portfolio income as well as the NAV when trying to determine how much one of these businesses could be worth.

Picton (LSE: PCTN) is a good example. The firm has a quality portfolio, and it’s been able to sell selected assets into the market at or around book value, justifying the portfolio’s overall NAV. Despite this, the stock is trading at a discount of around 25% to its 100p per share NAV value.

Analysts at Panmure Liberum believe this value could rise to 115p by 2028 thanks to rent increases across the portfolio and growth in asset values. The stock also yields 5% on a forward basis. Put all of those factors together, and the stock looks cheap.

The management agrees. Following its deployment of £17.3 million to buy back about 4.4% of its shares since January 2025, Picton recently announced a further buyback of up to £12.5 million – the best use of capital given where the shares are today.

By contrast, Regional Reit (LSE: RGL) faces a more uncertain outlook. The company is trading at a near-40% discount to NAV, with an 8% dividend yield, but its portfolio of mainly regional office buildings is only 78.6% occupied.

In the first half of the company’s financial year, it managed to push through rent increases of 4% on new lettings, which is positive, but it’s around half the rate of Picton’s, illustrating the supply/demand fundamentals of these two markets. Picton has also lost four tenants this year as they’ve upgraded their office space.

Regional is also having to invest millions upgrading the quality of its assets to meet government environmental standards and has a major debt maturity deadline in August 2026. So, while the shares might look cheap, it’s arguable that the business does deserve to trade at a discount considering its lower-quality portfolio and weaker balance sheet.

British Land (LSE: BLND) is another example of a Reit best avoided. Despite being one of the largest listed Reits in the UK, the group’s approach to asset management has left a lot to be desired.

Broker Panmure Liberum pulled no punches in its report on British Land’s full-year results published in May, noting group earnings per share hadn’t risen in a decade. It added: “Holding brand-new offices at yields of about 5% on the balance sheet isn’t doing much for beating your cost of capital over the medium term”.

The broker said the company would be better off selling older assets to fund new developments in the pipeline (as yet to be funded) rather than allowing debt to creep up as it has been doing. “We think the market will be in ‘wait and see’ mode,” the note signed off. Since this damning verdict, the shares have slumped, falling 17%.

One of the more interesting Reits in the sector, which tends to fly under the radar (mainly due to its size, which at £172 million puts it below the reach of most fund managers), is AEW Reit (LSE: AEWU). This trust is focused on finding undervalued assets. It likes to buy property with robust income streams, but with the potential for improvement either via development or renegotiating the lease.

The group is “sector agnostic”, so it can make trades in different areas of the market wherever it sees value. The market clearly appreciates this strategy as, despite the trust’s small size, it trades relatively close to net asset value, in contrast to the rest of the sector.

In June, AEW acquired Freemans Leisure Park, an 8.4-acre freehold site in the centre of Leicester, for £11.2 million, with a net initial yield of 10.6%. This in itself is a great deal and the team at AEW has plans to make the asset even more productive by utilising undeveloped land to build hotels and restaurants, introducing electric-vehicle charging and pushing through rent increases at upcoming rental reviews.

The company is hoping to replicate the success of a previous asset, Central Six Retail Park, Coventry, which it acquired for £16.4 million in November 2021, and sold part of in December last year for £26 million for an internal rate of return of 16%, excluding the remaining part of the retail park that AEW is holding onto.

The management is committed to a quarterly dividend of 2p per share (a yield of around 7.6% on the current share price), and the company’s balance sheet is relatively clean, with a debt-to-gross-asset-value ratio of 25% and a low fixed cost of debt of 2.959% until May 2027.

Profits in care homes

Target Healthcare (LSE: THRL) is worth considering for its unique exposure to a segment of the UK property market that’s generally overlooked.

The company owns and manages a portfolio of purpose-built care homes across the UK. At the end of June, it owned 93 assets worth around £1 billion. The issues in the UK social-care sector have been well publicised, and the scale of the problem was laid bare in a recent Knight Frank report, “Healthcare Development Opportunities”.

The report notes that, while the UK’s population of over-65s has grown by 20.7% over the past decade, the number of care-home beds has only risen by 2.9%. Virtually all of this supply has come from just one region, the West Midlands. Strip this region out of the data, and the number of care-home beds has declined.

Target has the size and scale to capitalise on this market dislocation. The management is actively and proactively managing the portfolio to achieve the best returns. It recently sold a property for £9.6 million at an 8% premium to book value and has renegotiated several leases where a tenant failed to pay the rent on time (less than 5% of the rent roll overall). Target managed to renegotiate these leases at a higher rate.

The majority of the leases agreed by the company are on inflation-linked, upward-only annual rent reviews, with a weighted average duration of nearly 26 years. This quality portfolio does not deserve the discount the market has currently assigned to the Reit. The shares are trading at a discount to NAV of around 20% and there’s also a dividend yield of 6% on offer.

PHP (LSE: PHP) has similar attractive qualities. While some investors have expressed concern about the company’s level of borrowing after the merger with peer Assura, the commercial logic of operating a large, diverse portfolio of healthcare assets remains compelling.

Most leases are inflation-linked and the income generated from the portfolio is effectively backstopped by the government. The enlarged group will also play a key role in the growth of the NHS estate and modernising the countrywide primary-care network.

Considering the quality of the income stream, PHP’s current discount to its 2026 projected net asset value of 109p per share looks unwarranted, especially considering the 7.6% dividend yield on offer.

A £1.3 billion pipeline of new developments

Now PRS is leaving the market, Grainger (LSE: GRI) is one of the best pure-play operators for investors to gain access to the build-to-rent residential property sector, with 11,000 rental homes. The group has just completed its transition from a standard corporation into a Reit, which means, under the Reit rules, the company must distribute 90% of its rental income every year.

In exchange, management expects the company will save as much as £15 million in corporate tax in the first year. Grainger says it will reinvest any unrestricted tax savings, and earnings are expected to jump by 25% in the current year, then 50% by fiscal 2029.

Part of this will come from the tax boost, but part will also come from property developments. The firm has a £1.3 billion pipeline of 4,500 homes and these are filling up as fast as the group can build them.

In March, the group launched The Kimmeridge, its flagship 150-home development and first built-to-rent scheme in Oxford. It filled all spaces in just seven months, five months ahead of schedule. Within a week Grainger also announced it had let 50% of the 132 build-to-rent homes in less than a month at its Seraphina Apartments development in Canning Town. The take up was “well ahead of expectations”, according to the company.

Across the rest of the existing portfolio, occupancy is sitting at 98%-99% and last year the group pushed through high single-digit percentage rent increases across the portfolio, thanks to the lack of supply and increased demand for rental properties across the UK. There are few if any other markets that have the ability to push through inflation-plus rent hikes in the same way.

Despite the quality of the company’s portfolio, it’s trading at a near-40% discount to its last reported NAV of 300p per share. The City has pencilled in a dividend per share of 9p a year by 2029 as the company’s growth and Reit transition pays off, implying a yield of around 5% by the end of the decade on the current share price.

For any new readers there are only 3 rules.

Rule One.

Buy Investment Trusts/ETF’s that pay a dividend and use those dividends to buy more Investment Trusts/ETF’s that pay a dividend.

Rule Two.

Rule 3.

Remember the Rules.

Gresham House Energy Storage to resume dividends at low level until 2027 as it prioritises growth

• 24 September 2025
• QuotedData

(Updated with our comment) Gresham House Energy Storage (GRID) will only pay a minimum dividend of 0.11p per share next month as it focuses on investment in growth and upgrades to its battery portfolio.

In half-year results today, the £412m investment trust said it would resume dividend payments that were suspended last year in response to a sharp decline in UK energy trading revenues.

However, the company emphasised that its financial priority was completing the three-year plan unveiled last November and doubling its capacity from 1.7GWh to 3.5GWh. As part of that, it wants capacity from new projects to grow 65% from 1.1GW to 1.8GW by extending the average duration of batteries from 1.6 to around two hours.

Once construction spending was completed, assuming current merchant revenues of £75k/MW/Yr its portfolio could generate excess cash flows of about 10p per share. That would enable the restoration of covered half-year dividends from 2027 although it did not say at what level.

In an update to its capital allocation policy, the company told shareholders it would pay a covered single dividend of at least 0.25p next year. 

This compares to the uncovered 5.5p and 7p total dividends GRID paid in 2023 and 2022. 

Chair John Leggate said: “The board believes that the growth opportunities we see represent the best future total return for investors and we are pleased to see good support for the approach among our shareholders. The growth that GRID aims to deliver over the next two years should significantly increase the revenue-generating base for the company, which will in turn drive greater long-term returns for shareholders.”

GRID shares have rebounded 43.5% in the past year but remain on a wide 33% discount to net asset value in response to the volatility and uncertainty over battery storage revenues. At 73p they trade less than half their 179p peak in September 2022 and 27% below the 100p at which they launched in 2018.

The results showed NAV fell 1.5% to 107.71p per share in the six months to 30 June as higher valuations on new projects becoming operational could not offset the impact of further cuts in power price forecasts. 

Nevertheless, underlying portfolio revenues jumped 76.9% to £31.7m from £17.9m a year ago, reflecting improved revenues and increased capacity. Net debt to NAV was 18% before the company’s recent refinancing with £160m of borrowing up £10m from a year ago with £48.2m of cash.

Our view

Matthew Read, senior analyst at QuotedData, said: “From an operational perspective, GRID continues to deliver with revenues and EBITDA almost doubling year-on-year, while achieving a notable milestone in surpassing 1GW of operational capacity. With augmentations underway, GRID’s battery fleet is steadily shifting towards longer-duration assets. The payback period on these investments tends to be short, reflecting the benefits of the additional revenue opportunities the longer-duration assets offer. However, the problem continues to lie in the valuation backdrop.

“There were a number of factors positively influencing the NAV progression, but the NAV still edged down at the margin, as third-party power price forecasts continue to be cut. This problem is not unique to GRID and has weighed on NAVs across the sector. However, these include assumptions about the amount of new generating capacity – including renewables – that will come online. We are increasingly wondering whether the projected power price falls may be overdone as, presumably, some of the expected new capacity will not be built if the price is too low.

“We think that the decision to prioritise reinvestment over distributions is probably the right one but shareholders who are waiting for meaningful dividends may not share this view as they will have to hold on until 2027 to see this happen. However, if GRID’s management can deliver on its three-year plan – doubling installed capacity to 3.5GWh and securing long-term contracted revenues – the fund should be in a much stronger position to provide sustainable income backed by a bigger, more valuable portfolio.

“Clearly execution risk remains – particularly around NESO’s queue reforms and the regulatory process – but if Ofgem’s rule changes (such as GC0166) and NESO’s reforms come through as hoped, shareholders could be well-rewarded for their patience.”

Written By QD News

2 FTSE 250 dividend shares with double the current index yield

Jon Smith presents the case for two FTSE 250 stocks with yields above 6.8% that could provide an investor with high levels of income going forward.

Posted by Jon Smith

Published 25 September

When investing, your capital is at risk. The value of your investments can go down as well as up and you may get back less than you put in.

The content of this article is provided for information purposes only and is not intended to be, nor does it constitute, any form of personal advice. Investments in a currency other than sterling are exposed to currency exchange risk. Currency exchange rates are constantly changing, which may affect the value of the investment in sterling terms. You could lose money in sterling even if the stock price rises in the currency of origin. Stocks listed on overseas exchanges may be subject to additional dealing and exchange rate charges, and may have other tax implications, and may not provide the same, or any, regulatory protection as in the UK.

The average dividend yield of the FTSE 250 is 3.38%. Of course, within the index, there are many different stocks, some with higher or lower respective yields. For investors who like to be active in their picks, doubling the index yield can be possible, even without having to take on a really high level of risk.

Building the future

One option to consider is International Public Partnership (LSE:INPP). The company invests in a large diversified portfolio of infrastructure assets and businesses. These are often under public-private partnership structures or similar long-term contracts like building schools.

Should you buy International Public Partnerships Limited shares today?

Over the past year, the share price is down a modest 5%, with the dividend yield at 6.94%. One reason why I believe the dividend is sustainable is due to the nature of the contracts. They often span several years, with deals linked to inflation, which protects the cash flows and makes it predictable. As a result, the company can look to budget around revenues with some visibility. Although this doesn’t mean it’ll never post a loss, it does provide confidence that management can generate cash in future years sufficient to cover dividend commitments.

It also has a clear dividend policy, so investors know what they are getting themselves into. For example, International Public Partnership says that it expects full dividend cash coverage from net operating cash flow before capital activity. This is quite important as it means the company expects that its operating cash generation (before considering things like buying or selling assets) is sufficient to cover the dividend.

One risk is the concentration of projects with the government. Even with long-term contracts, if the administration decides to cut back spending on certain areas, it will eventually have a negative impact on the company’s revenue overall.

Buying a potential dip

Another idea is Greencoat UK Wind (LSE:UKW). It’s a UK-listed renewable infrastructure investment trust focused exclusively on UK wind farms. Over the past year, the stock is down 22%, with a current dividend yield of 9.66%.

Let’s first address the share price fall over this time period. Part of this reflects a drop in the net asset value (NAV). The stock does follow the movements in the value of the portfolio, which is its wind farms. Therefore, lower valuations have dragged the share price down with it.

Another factor has been that wholesale electricity prices have come down compared to the highs. That directly affects revenue from electricity sales, especially for parts of the portfolio not in fixed contracts. I’m not too concerned here for the long term, as commodity prices are volatile and therefore could bounce back just as quickly as they fell.

Despite these problems, the dividend per share has been increasing over the past few years. It aims to align the dividend increase with inflation, which is a positive. In the latest H1 2025 results, the dividend cover was 1.4. Anything above one shows that the current earnings per share can completely cover the dividend. Therefore, I don’t see any immediate worry with any potential cuts.

Even though the above stocks are higher risk than normal, the large dividend yield could make them attractive enough for an investor to consider.

Persistent REIT Mispricing Presents Opportunity: Gaining An Edge Assessing This Sector

Sep. 22, 2025 9:30 AM ETVanguard Real Estate Index Fund ETF Shares VNQ, SCHH

Dane Bowler

Summary

• REITs are prone to significant mispricing due to their complexity and small market caps, creating opportunities for skilled stock pickers.
• The sector’s complexity stems from diverse property types, varying locations, and inconsistent non-GAAP financial metrics like FFO and AFFO.
• Currently, REITs trade at notable discounts to NAV and earnings multiples, making them attractive compared to the broader market.
• While broad REIT ETFs like VNQ offer value, targeted stock selection within REITs can yield superior returns by exploiting market inefficiencies.
• Looking for a portfolio of ideas like this one?

The market is not fully efficient, with mispricing prevalent across equities. REITs have a particularly high degree of mispricing, with individual REITs both over- and undervalued.

More mispricing means more opportunity for enhanced returns through careful stock selection, but also a higher difficulty.

Let me begin by discussing the factors that have led to persistent mispricing in REITs and then move on to discuss the analytical concepts that can give one an edge in REIT investment.

Why REITs have more mispricing than the broader market

REITs have a high ratio of complexity to size.

Complexity refers to the quantum of knowledge/expertise/resources required to analyze something, while size refers to market cap.

Market cap dictates the quantity of resources that can be allocated to analysis. Massive financial institutions have the resources to fully and properly analyze anything. However, it’s not worth it for them to dedicate resources to small market cap areas because they would not be able to invest a significant portion of their capital there anyway.

These institutions often have many billions to invest, so any position under maybe $50-$100 million would potentially be an irrelevantly small percentage.

An institution cannot invest $100 million in a $1B market cap stock without dramatically altering market pricing. Therefore, they largely stay away from small caps.

REITs as a whole are not very big. On 5/9/25 we calculated the combined market cap of all equity REITs at both the common and preferred levels, and it summed to a grand total of $1.38 trillion.

Source: REIT Sector Gallery

A substantial portion of that $1.38 trillion consists of a few very large companies. The top 10 are just about half of the entire market cap of REITs.

There’s arguably enough institutional attention among these large caps to have somewhat efficient pricing. Institutions can be wrong, and one can potentially still outperform in these names with a unique understanding or a differentiated thesis, but generally the pricing of these particular REITs makes sense.

It’s in the rest of the REIT market where mispricing is rampant. Less than $700B of market cap is split between over 250 common and preferred issues. That’s a tiny average issue size, which, as discussed above, limits the resources that can be spent studying each one.

That small size is made all the more challenging by the immense complexity of REITs.

Complexity factors

Specifically, REITs are challenging to analyze for the following reasons:

• Dozens of property types with distinctly different fundamentals.
• Properties located across 50 MSAs with individual supply and demand aspects
• Non-GAAP financial metrics like FFO and AFFO
• Definitions of non-GAAP financial metrics differ from company to company with minimal standardization

Property types and locations

In our analysis we note 20 distinct property types but it could be broken down much further. Healthcare, for example, actually has hospitals, medical office, assisted living, memory care, independent living, skilled nursing, and a few other smaller categories, but it’s often lumped together as the “healthcare” REIT subsector.

To glean the prospects of a given REIT, one must know not just the property types, but also the location specifics. For example, Houston has a massive amount of new apartments being constructed, while some of the midwestern markets remain undersupplied.

Since REITs often own assets in many different MSAs, there’s a significant knowledge barrier to estimating fundamental trajectory.

Non-GAAP metrics with differing definitions

The accounting rules on property depreciation make earnings and earnings per share almost useless metrics for REITs. GAAP accounting records a roughly 3% annual charge against property purchase price for depreciation, while in reality, the properties may be appreciating or depreciating at a very different pace.

As such, the REIT industry primarily uses non-GAAP metrics for earnings. NAREIT, the third-party governance organization, has defined FFO which is an adaptation to GAAP earnings that takes away gain on sale but adds back property depreciation. For decades, FFO was the dominant metric for valuing REITs.

In recent years, however, Adjusted Funds From Operations, AFFO, has taken over as the preferred metric. In many ways, AFFO is better because it accounts for costs such as recurring maintenance and things like amortization of tenant improvement costs. However, AFFO is not a defined metric, and each company will have their own calculation for AFFO.

Some companies like to sneak in various adjustments to AFFO that make their AFFO higher than what would properly be considered “true earnings.” Specifically, we have come across the following non-standard addbacks:

• Stock-based compensation
• Non-real estate depreciation
• Maintenance capex categorized as growth capex
• Strategic straight-lining (or not straight lining) of non-linear cash flow streams

These adjustments can be as much as 20% of AFFO, and if an analyst is not accounting for them on an individual company basis, it can throw off relative valuation. Many REITs screen as good values but are less appealing when accounting definitions are aligned.

Property level metrics are also industry specific and have differing definitions:

• Net Operating Income (NOI)
• Same-store pool
• Cap Rate (GAAP versus cash) (economic vs headline)

Each REIT has a different definition of what qualifies a property for being included in the same-store pool. Some REITs will start to include properties before they are fully stabilized (due to a loose definition of stabilized). This can artificially raise reported same-store NOI growth as stabilization is essentially being mischaracterized as organic growth.

Looking at the headline numbers, one REIT may report 7% same-store NOI growth while another reports 5%, but the 5% REIT may actually be growing faster. The only way to find out is to dig into each company’s same-store pool definition and also account for capex applied in the relevant period.

Cap rates are also a bit tricky to understand. Not only is the metric inverse, where a higher cap rate means the property is cheaper, but the actual calculation of a cap rate can be done in many different ways. Some REITs report headline or NOI-based cap rates while others use economic cap rates that factor in expected capex. There can also be as much as 200 basis points of difference between GAAP (straight line) and cash cap rates (cash on year 1).

Rampant mispricing in REITs

None of the above complexity factors are insurmountable. Teams of analysts with enough resources can dig through all these factors to obtain really clean cash flows and form legitimate projections from that.

The challenge is that there are very few institutions committing such resources to REITs because market caps are so small.

So, REITs are primarily left with an investor base that’s not equipped with enough time/expertise/resources to properly value them. As a result, market prices are often off by a considerable magnitude. In our experience watching REITs trade every day, market prices often move in groups with minimal differentiation for individual company fundamentals.

In the short term, a REIT’s price movement seems to fluctuate more based on the broad category in which it falls rather than the granular aspects of its individual business. This sort of environment lends itself to greater disparities between market price and fundamental value.

Some REITs are dramatically overvalued, while others can be bought at 60% of net asset value. It’s fruitful territory for stock pickers with the skills to navigate the difficult sector.

General cheapness of sector

Given the lack of granular focus discussed above, REITs have largely traded based on broad macro factors that tangentially affect them. The market broadly believes REITs are adversely affected by interest rates, so the sector has languished since Fed hikes started in 2022. This has left REITs quite cheap relative to the broader market.

Specifically, the median REIT is trading at

• 84.9% of NAV
• 13.5X forward FFO
• 15.3X forward AFFO

Discounted valuation at a time when the overall stock market is priced expensively makes REITs generally opportunistic. As such, I believe one could buy a broad REIT ETF like the Vanguard REIT ETF (NYSEARCA:VNQ) and outperform the market.

However, such an ETF would not take advantage of the rampant mispricing within REITs. ETFs own based on market cap, which makes them dominated by the more efficiently priced REITs. Even among the mid-cap holdings of ETFs, they would hold both the overvalued and the undervalued.

I see far greater opportunity in being a stock picker within REITs.

With enough experience and understanding of the nuances of REIT valuation/accounting, it’s quite discernible which REITs are trading below fundamental value. The future is uncertain, so not every discounted REIT will be a winner, but a portfolio consisting of specifically the underpriced portion of the mispriced REIT universe is well positioned to come out ahead.

Analysis-Global investors, blindsided by stunning US comeback, jump back in

Thu, September 25, 2025

By Naomi Rovnick

LONDON (Reuters) -An investor out of the United States and into Europe and Asia has reversed course as big money managers ride a wave of AI and interest rate-cut euphoria into the year-end, ditching the “rest-of-the world” trade for now.

Global fund managers had offloaded U.S. stocks at a record pace after President Donald Trump unveiled steep reciprocal tariffs on April 2. The market has recovered since then, however, and U.S. stocks have surged 7% in the last quarter.

Wall Street’s market supremacy is back and investors are likely to favor U.S. assets in the coming quarter as traders price in 110 basis points of Federal Reserve rate cuts by end-2026 and AI juggernauts boost analysts’ stock market targets and U.S. economic growth.

“There’s no need for pessimism right now about the U.S.,” said Salman Ahmed, Fidelity International’s global head of macroeconomics and strategic asset allocation. He was positive on U.S. small-cap stocks that typically benefit from rate cuts and had turned neutral on Europe and Japan.

The Fed last week cut rates for the first time since December.

BIG INVESTORS, IN U-TURN, BET ON US EQUITIES -BofA

In June, global fund managers surveyed by Bank of America were the most negative on U.S. stocks and the dollar out of all major asset classes. But by early September, these big investors were betting again on U.S. equities, buying back into the dollar and reducing exposure to euro zone, emerging market and UK stocks, BofA’s survey showed.

Francesco Sandrini, Italy CIO at Europe’s biggest investor Amundi, said he was currently tilting his portfolios towards the U.S. and expected smaller domestically focused companies to benefit in particular from rate cuts. He had turned less positive on European banks and Chinese stocks.

Data from fund tracking service Lipper, whose figures provide a snapshot of the global mood, showed investors resumed buying U.S. stocks in August after pulling almost $78 billion from the asset class in the three months prior.

Flows into euro zone funds that report to Lipper, which hit a 12-month high of almost $3 billion in April, dwindled to $563 million by August.

Investors said these moves showed how diversifying away from the U.S. was a better idea in theory than in practice.

“You cannot get away from the U.S.,” Russell Investments global head of fixed income and foreign exchange solutions strategy Van Luu said. “Especially with equities.”

Measured in dollars, the de facto reporting currency for many global investors, the benchmark S&P 500 index has outpaced its European equivalent since June. U.S. small caps have edged ahead of Europe’s since late August.

Weekly flows into U.S. equity funds tracked by EPFR hit a year-to-date high of almost $58 billion last week as euro zone funds drew in just $1 billion and Japan funds registered zero net inflows, Barclays’ analysis of the data showed.

TREASURIES BACK IN VOGUE

The U.S. asset comeback can also be seen in bonds.

French budget strife and Germany’s borrowing bonanza have lifted euro zone bond yields by about 15 bps this quarter as equivalent U.S. yields have fallen by roughly the same amount. Bond yields move inversely to prices.

Of the major U.S. assets hit by April’s tariff turmoil, only the dollar is lagging, but it has stabilised.

After the greenback posted its worst first-half of the year against the euro in the six months to June, an index measuring the greenback against rivals including the euro is up 0.8% this quarter.

Some investors said they were returning to Wall Street with one eye on the exit given medium-term risks such as Trump’s trade levies exacerbating U.S. inflation and weighing on growth.

“The (market) momentum is certainly there, but let’s take it quarter by quarter,” Fidelity’s Ahmed said.

He saw “shades of 2000” in the AI stock boom, warning that a repeat of that year’s dotcom stock crash could create an economic shock by reducing consumer wealth.

U.S. households’ equity ownership has hit a 75-year high and stocks owned directly or through retirement vehicles represent 68% of their total wealth, analysis of Fed data by consultancy Capital Economics showed.

“That should ring alarm bells, even if the buoyant stock market keeps rising for a while,” Capital Economics said.

Foresight Group managing director Mayank Markanday expected U.S. savers who have parked a record $7.7 trillion in U.S. money market funds to move into domestic stocks or high-yielding U.S. corporate debt as rates fall.

“The only positive for the rest of the world is that valuations remain more attractive in relation to the U.S.,” he said.

“However its definitely not the time to cut your U.S. exposure and swing heavily towards that rest-of-the-world trade.”

(Reporting by Naomi Rovnick; editing by Dhara Ranasinghe and Bernadette Baum)

Goldman Warns: Enjoy The Market Calm While It Lasts—October Chaos Is Coming

Piero Cingari

Wed, September 24, 2025

The best-performing September in 15 years just sent U.S. stock indexes to new highs — but that party could soon end, with Goldman Sachs expecting a surge in market volatility as October kicks off a gauntlet of earnings and macro risk.

With just days left in the month, the S&P 500, tracked by the Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (NYSE:VOO), is up 3.6%, on pace for its best September since 2010. That year, the index jumped 8.76%, while in 1997 it rose 6.22% — two of the only times the market defied September’s historically weak trend to this degree.

Tech stocks are doing even better. The Nasdaq 100, via the Invesco QQQ Trust (NASDAQ:QQQ), is up 5.5%, and the Technology Select Sector SPDR Fund (NYSE:XLK) has surged 7.5%, its second-strongest September since the ETF launched in 1999.

That’s not normal. Over the last 25 years, tech stocks have averaged a 2.2% loss in September.

But this year, names like Oracle Corp. (NYSE:ORCL), Tesla Inc. (NASDAQ:TSLA), Micron Technology Inc. (NASDAQ:MU) and Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) have led a momentum surge fueled by AI demand and expectations of Federal Reserve rate cuts.

The result? A rare, almost euphoric September rally that feels more like July or December.

October Might Snap Investors Back To Reality

In a note published Tuesday, Goldman Sachs equity analyst John Marshall said the good times may not last. “Using history as a guide, we expect global equity volatility to increase in October.”

And the data supports that. Over the past several decades, realized volatility in October has been more than 25% higher than in other months, according to Goldman. The firm pointed to a long-standing pattern of surging trading activity, driven by corporate earnings pressure, year-end performance benchmarking and major macro catalysts.

“Event volatility could increase further as October earnings season is typically the most volatile of the year,” Goldman said, adding that FOMC meetings, Fed commentary, and the Consumer Price Index (CPI) report will all be in sharp focus.

October Is a Pressure Cooker for Wall Street

Goldman also noted that single stock trading volumes — both in shares and options — have historically peaked in October. From 1996 to 2024, the average daily notional volume of individual stocks and their options reached its highest point in October, reinforcing the idea that investors feel forced to act.

“We see this as further validating our hypothesis that performance pressure potentially drives investors to increase trading activity,” Goldman said.

The firm expects the volatility spike to be broad-based, but sees opportunities in single-stock options as a way to position around earnings-driven moves.

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Brace For The Shift

After a rare, euphoric September where stocks broadly defied seasonal gravity, October may come with a price. While earnings optimism and Fed tailwinds have powered this rally, volatility season is approaching — and traders might want to buckle up.

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