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Last Friday (September 16, 2011), Rayonier (RYN) announced its intent to acquire 250,000 acres of timberlands in the US South for $330 million. Expected to close in the fourth quarter of this year, the deal would bring Rayonier’s timberland ownership more…
It’s December 31, 2010 and you’re sitting on a pile of cash. Do you invest in the S&P 500, an all-REIT index, private timberlands or publicly-traded timber REITs? Based on the performance of key indices, putting your chips in with more…
Who buys the trees grown by timberland-owning REITs? Timber REIT returns depend on strong demand from end-use markets for forest products such as lumber, plywood, pulp and OSB. This explains the dependence that timber REITs have on housing markets. Low more…
How can timber REITs leverage their available capital, given the fact that they must distribute, and cannot retain, earnings? Over time, timberland-owning REITs have identified and employed multiple investment strategies to leverage available capital. These strategies include: “Recycling capital” through programs more…
According to Forisk tracking of timberland ownership, 58 firms currently own or manage in excess of 100,000 acres of timberlands in the United States. These firms feature the following descriptive statistics: As a group, they own/manage 57.6 million acres of more…
In an earlier post (February 15, 2011), we wrote about the pace-setting performance of timberland-owning REITs, as measured by the Forisk Timber REIT (FTR) Index, vis-à-vis other asset classes. In revisiting this theme after close to two quarters of stomach-churning more…
“How do timberland investment managers make money?” The question itself, asked by an analyst working for an institutional investor, was straightforward enough. However, it was the third time in the past week our team had received a call with such more…
Recent comments by Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) Chairman Sheila Blair regarding minimum down-payments of up to 20% for “qualified residential mortgages” (QRM) echoed discussions about residential housing markets at the UGA Timberland Investment Conference. Our Equity Research Team (Neena more…
From the desk of Dr. Tim Sydor, Forest Economist: The 2011 Timberland Investment Conference, hosted last week by the University of Georgia’s (UGA) Center for Forest Business at Lake Oconee, attracted over 350 participants from all aspects of the timberland more…