JOURNALISM
TO SAY THAT 2021 was a year that had an unrelentingly break-neck speed of a news cycle would be an understatement, and there was no shortage of stories capturing the attention of Canadian financial journalists (or any journalist for that matter).
Here’s an often-quoted statistic: 20 per cent of businesses don’t survive in the first two years of their opening. Five years go by and that number balloons to 45 per cent. Give it ten years, and that’s 65 per cent. Only a quarter of these businesses make it to their 15th birthday. This is a … Continue reading Tug-of-War: Canada’s Small Business Community & Rolling Restrictions
Even more valuable than the profits investors make in the stock market are the hard lessons they learn along the way… Thing is, the lessons are only valuable if they’re actually learned. I’ve been meaning to write about this topic for a while since the year 2019 presented an interesting case study with (often misplaced) … Continue reading The Lessons Learned from the Tech Unicorn Stampede of ‘19
If you worked an office job many years ago and five o’clock rolled around, you would stretch, gather your things, and clock out for the day. Maybe you’d even leave a half-hour earlier if it’s a Friday. It’s five o’clock freedom and you’re probably running through weekend plans, chores to cross off your to-do list — anything … Continue reading The End of Nine-to-Five: The Inevitable Gig Economy
Introduction The Toronto housing market stands at the intersection of housing affordability and availability, with asking rents trending higher amid wages that struggle to keep up. While average rental rates for private condominiums (condos) have outpaced increases in wages, so too have rates for purpose-built rentals. Exacerbating the issue further, developers are economically incentivized … Continue reading High and Low: The Soaring Demand and Limited Supply of Toronto’s
Purpose-Built Multifamily Market
Easy come, easy go: Amazon cancels plans for Long Island City — but what does this mean for the office it’s leaving behind? Photo Credit: Jeffrey Zeldman. In February 2019, Amazon, Inc. (Amazon) officially broke it off with Long Island City (LIC), cancelling previously announced plans to construct a 4.0 million-square foot (sf ) campus in the city’s … Continue reading Queen for 90 Days — What’s Next for Long Island City’s One Court Square?
Malls were emphasizing the importance of keeping anchor tenants, but in the case of Payless Shoesource, it now appears that the shoe is on the other foot. Photo Credit: Mike Mozart The closure of all 2,300 of Payless ShoeSource’s (Payless or the Company) stores in the United States and Canada seems like a minimal event on … Continue reading Unhappy Feet 2: Payless ShoeSource Files for Second Bankruptcy in Total Store Shutdown
Introduction The store closures announced by Shopko will likely have a minimal impact on commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS) in aggregate; however, DBRS, Inc. (DBRS) does see the potential for localized defaults as the company rejects leases across the country. In addition, the closures highlight the risk of exposure faced by retailers owned by private … Continue reading Monitoring “The Stuff That Counts”: Shopko’s Closures Minimally Affect CMBS Transactions
For the past 14 months, news outlets have been gripped by Amazon.com Inc.’s (Amazon) selection process for its second headquarters (HQ2). For cities in the running, the prospect of a major tech company like Amazon expanding into their areas would mean a significant economic boost with analysts forecasting as many as 50,000 new jobs and … Continue reading How One Court Square Won Big with Amazon’s HQ2 Bid
Investment Activity Although regional malls have generated negative headlines over the past few years, the recent acquisitions of the Westfield Group (Westfield) by Paris-based Unibail-Rodamco (Unibail) and General Growth Properties (GGP) by Brookfield Property Partners (Brookfield) may signal new opportunities in the space. Unibail purchased Westfield in 2017 for $15.8 billion in a deal that … Continue reading The Retail Crossroads: Exploring the Potential for Malls
Stephanie Hughes 