Bidder competition in REOC and REIT takeover contests

Corporate sales through mergers and acquisitions constitute a large marketss and are, thus, frequently examined in financial research. By the use of micro-level data from deal backgrounds, previous academic work depicted the bidding behavior and further peculiarities of competition and valuation in non-public takeover auction processes for a broad range of operating companies. The presented research provides an enhancement on the perspective of the previous contributions by adding the particular scope on real estate operating companies (REOCs) and real estate investment trusts (REITs), as well as an auction theoretic perspective. Specifically, it analyses valuation patterns in auction-like takeover deals and reports similarities and differences to prior evidence in that field. In accordance with earlier contributions, a hand-collected dataset of takeover deal-disclosure filings was used to assess the bidding behavior of potential buyers and the strategic interaction of buyers and sellers. Preliminary evidence suggests that heterogeneous types of buyers value real estate industry members differently when it comes to corporate sales and depicts characteristic patterns in valuation. The presented research may help to develop a deeper understanding of the strategic interactions in real estate corporate sales. From a practical perspective, the deal design in corporate sales appears to be of utmost importance. The implications are relevant for both, corporate governance and investment decision making.