Australian and New Zealand property firms provided the highest total investment return in July from a global index of listed real estate companies, according to a report.
The benchmark index from Amsterdam-based Global Property Research (GPR), is based on returns from both capital gains and dividends for the top 250 most liquid property companies worldwide.
GPR said returns for its Oceania index, which includes Australia and New Zealand, were 2.3 percent in July with most of this performance coming from Australian property stocks. The researchers said the recent stream of property trust mergers in Australia had boosted property stock values.
The rash of mergers began with Westfield's decision earlier this year to merge three of its property trusts.
Now the giant Lend Lease Corporation has made an offer for General Property Trust, Centro Properties has agreed to acquire Prime Retail Group, Macquarie Office Trust and Principal America Office Trust have agreed to merge and Deutsche is merging three of its trusts.
