GLOBAL – A new global real estate index which favours institutional investors is to be launched next month by the European Public Real Estate Association (EPRA), the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts (NAREIT) and Euronext.

The new index, called EPRA/NAREIT Global Index, is a composite of the existing EPRA European index and new indices in North America and Asia. It will contain some 250 publicly listed real estate companies in 21 countries throughout these geographical regions.

Stocks are weighted according to free float and the inclusion criteria is designed to reflect the preferences of institutional investors, says EPRA. These include needing a certain minimum market capitalisation and daily trading volume and annual reports in English. “Having a certain daily trading volume gives institutional investors a sure and easy way to get both in and out the index,” says EPRA spokesperson, Nick van Ommen.

Amsterdam based Euronext Indices BV, will take care of calculating the index, initially on a daily basis, and it will be distributed and reported via established data vendors such as Bloomberg, Datastream and Reuters, as well as via the EPRA, NAREIT and Euronext websites.

The partners intend to move to a real-time calculation platform in the near future.

The main index will be supported by a series of individual country sub-indices, to be listed in euros, US dollars, sterling and local currencies, as well as in terms of price and total return.

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