JLL Swells its Kitty in Australia - Analyst Blog

Jones Lang LaSalle Incorporated (JLL), a leading real estate investment trust (REIT), has recently decided to acquire Australian fund manager Trinity Funds Management for A$9.3 million from Australian property group Trinity Group and property firm Clarence Property Corp. The acquisition is a concerted effort by Jones Lang to increase its assets under management (AUM) in Australia to A$5 billion dollars by 2016.

With the deal, the company has presently swelled its AUM kitty in the country to A$1.7 billion. The strategic purchase was made by LaSalle Investment Management, the real estate investment arm of Jones Lang. LaSalle Investment Management is one of the largest and most diverse in the real estate sector with over $43 billion of AUM across the globe.

Chicago-based Jones Lang is a full-service real estate services firm that provides corporate, financial, and investment management services to corporations and other real estate owners, users, and investors worldwide. A broad real estate product and service range, and extensive knowledge of domestic and international real estate markets enable the company to operate as a one-stop provider of real estate solutions.

With about 185 corporate offices across the globe, Jones Lang operates in more than 1,000 locations in 60 countries. Jones Lang is an industry leader in property and corporate facility management services, with a portfolio of approximately 1.8 billion square feet worldwide.

Jones Lang continually invests in industry-leading research to identify emerging trends and anticipate future conditions to respond to the shifting market and business trends of its clients. This enables the company to develop new investment products and services tailored to the specific investment goals and objectives of its clients, thereby maintaining profitable long-term relationships during challenging market conditions.

We maintain our ‘Neutral' rating on Jones Lang, which presently has a Zacks #3 Rank that translates into a short-term Hold rating, indicating that the stock is expected to perform in line with the overall U.S. equity market for the next 1–3 months. We also have a Neutral recommendation and a Zacks #3 Rank for Grubb & Ellis Company (GBE), a competitor of Jones Lang.