From the May issue: It looks like sovereign wealth funds — which are made up of pools of money derived from a country’s reserve — are slowly returning to invest in commercial real estate in the United States.

Since the economic crisis of 2008, SWFs had decreased their investments in commercial real estate by at least 20 percent.

But the amount of money they’re investing now is substantial. By 2012, SWFs are expected to have $12 trillion in assets under management.

In one deal last month, the Qatari Investment Authority, the sovereign wealth fund for the tiny Middle East nation of Qatar, emerged as the backer for the largest downtown development under construction in the U.S. — a 10-acre project in Washington, D.C., called CityCenterDC, which broke ground in the first week of April. [more]

Officials from the city’s Economic Development Corp. met with the leaders of several Chinese firms yesterday for a Midtown Manhattan real estate office tour that included One Bryant Park and the Empire State Building, part of a larger, recent effort to attract foreign tenants to New York. According to the Wall Street Journal, the city is focusing on companies it sees as having big potential for growth. It has already courted a group of technology start-ups from London, and has plans to host businesses from Singapore and India in the coming months. [more]

From the October issue: New York City is at a peculiar crossroads. For months, investors have
marshaled unprecedented amounts of capital, salivating at the prospect
of snapping up distressed properties. “We’re fortunate this cycle to
have the most dry powder in our
history,” Blackstone Group president Tony James said last month at the
Barclays Capital Global Financial Services Conference, which was held
in Manhattan. The firm has about $28 billion in unspent capital, he
said. About $12 billion of that is earmarked for real estate. “We’re
just beginning what will be the best period in decades for private
investing,” he said. Dan Fasulo, a managing director at Real Capital
Analytics, estimated
that $50 billion has been raised and is ready to be deployed into
distressed real estate. Paradoxically, investors have found very little
worth buying so far, in large part because banks continue to hold
troubled loans on their books, hoping conditions will improve. [more]