公募基础设施REITs试点探索

2020年4月，我国正式启动公募基础设施REITs试点，2022年底，我国已发行了24只公募基础设施REITs，累计募集资金783.61亿元。试点积累了一定的实践经验，但也存在诸多问题，如基金架构设计复杂、税收政策不完善、项目遴选难度大、公众投资者参与度较低等。建议通过适时立法逐步尝试公司型REITs、构建系统的项目审核指标体系、完善配套税收优惠政策和多举措提高二级市场流动性、加快扩募进程等措施持续推进REITs市场健康发展。     

基础设施公募REITs时代到来

主持人:2021年我国基础设施公募REITs市场启航.6月21日,沪深交易所首批基础设施公募REITs正式上市,万亿级基础设施公募REITs市场起步.基础设施公募REITs试点对于盘活社会存量资产、降低宏观杠杆率、提升基础设施产业发展质效、丰富资本市场投融资品种等具有重要意义. 目前首批9只基础设施公募REITs已上市一个多月了.从交易价格、成交额、换手率等数据发现,公募REITs市场整体呈现出平稳运行的态势,目前有6只产品价格高于发行价,最高溢价率达4.78％.整体市场认可度较高,投资者认购活跃,产品上市以来,总体运行平稳,各项指标符合试点预期,取得了较好的开端. 基础设施R EITs,是存量基础设施项目以公开募集基金的形式进行融资的一种金融工具,既有利于盘活基础设施存量资产,回收资金用于新的项目建设,也有利于促进资金"脱虚向实",提高金融服务实体经济质量和效率.我国基础设施公募REITs市场空间有多大?此次公募REITs试点会面临哪些机遇与挑战?我国发展公募REITs可以汲取哪些国际经验?公募REITs对于我国金融事业发展有何长期意义?《金融博览》杂志与中国人民大学国际货币研究所(IMI)共同举办本期圆桌话题,就上述问题约请多位专家进行讨论. 公募REITs正式启航 《金融博览》:我国基础设施公募REITs率先启动,那么我国基础设施公募REITs市场空间有多大? 杨再平(IMI学术委员、亚洲金融合作协会创始秘书长、中国银行业协会原专职副会长):截至目前,我国基础设施累计投资额已超过150万亿元,而仅老年群体所持有的可投资资产就达百万亿元.可以设想,当百万亿元的成熟不动产存量资产与老年群体持有的百万亿元可投资资金跨时空有效撮合,其对盘活存量资产、降低宏观杠杆率、促进城乡基础设施螺旋式循环发展、丰富资本市场投融资品种、完善资产管理供给、老年群体生活周期的福利最大化安排,等等,会产生非常大且深刻的影响.这也就是为什么市场各界都看好基础设施公募REITs的理由.     

基础设施REITs试点的现状、问题和对策

在系统梳理我国基础设施投融资模式的基础上,对基础设施REITs试点的现状和问题进行讨论,研究发现首批基础设施REITs挂牌上市后存在税收政策不足、基础资产转让政策不完善、监管制度不完善、项目筛选难度加大、中介服务机构能力欠缺以及二级市场流动性不足等问题.针对存在的问题提出以下政策建议:健全税收优惠等相关法律制度、建立项目遴选审核指标体系、优化项目运营管理中介服务体系、完善二级市场做市商制度和组建多层次基础设施REITs项目智库,希望为进一步推进我国基础设施REITs市场健康发展、盘活存量资产、推动经济高质量发展提供借鉴.     

新型基础设施建设不动产投资信托基金的运作探索

新基建将为企业转型升级和建设工业强国释放新动能。基于基础设施REITs试点新政,分析了基础设施投融资的现状和新基建REITs的内生动力,可以发现新基建REITs发展具有稳投资、降杠杆、防风险等重要意义。研究构建了新基建REITs的运行框架,阐述了其“公募基金+资产支持专项计划”的产品结构,比较了新基建REITs与国内现有类REITs产品之间的显著差异,强调新基建REITs不仅面临委托代理、交易成本和不完全产权三个方面的理论困境,同时存在诸多现实挑战。据此,新基建REITs应秉承面向未来、接轨全球,引导国资、激活民资,谨慎试点、确保成功,加强监管、完善配套,由点及面、稳健推进的政策取向;建议采取完善基础设施REITs的具体规则、严格挑选新基建REITs试点项目、降低新基建REITs的交易成本、出台税收优惠扶持政策和培育新基建REITs生产性服务业等举措,促进新基建REITs的健康发展。     

基础设施公募REITs与地方政府债务风险化解

2022年新国发2号文件明确提出,将防范和化解地方政府债务风险作为保障国家经济安全的重要工作。本文基于贵州省地方政府债务风险现状及基础设施公募REITs在中国的发展情况,探究基础设施公募REITs作为权益型融资渠道,通过降低政府杠杆率在传统融资渠道模式困境中实现金融创新,并向市场注入经济发展动能,从而防范和化解地方政府债务风险。针对公募REITs推行过程中的项目筛选难度大、专业水平人才缺乏、治理机制不健全、政策仍处于探索阶段等问题,提出做好优质项目的储备和孵化、公募REITs智库组建等应对措施。本文为化解地方政府债务风险提供了有益参考,对稳步推进基础设施公募REITs后续发展具有一定的借鉴意义。     

基础设施REITs发展的国际经验及借鉴

REITs包括基础设施REITs都是在经济亟需刺激政策的背景下,各国政府为了实现经济政策目标而推出的,部分市场甚至由政府直接推动首批REITs上市。从国际市场发展现状看,主要的基础设施REITs市场都实现了良性循环,资本市场为基础设施融资和发展提供了强有力支持。从国际经验看,REITs立法的逻辑起点可以分为两大类,一类是将REITs定位成传递工具,一类是将REITs定位成集合投资工具,对应的免税政策也分别有两种不同逻辑。为促进基础设施REITs有序发展,兼顾投融资双方利益,本文提出了相应的法规政策原则和具体建议,包括如何处理好R E I T s法规与其他法规的关系,金融监管部门和其他政府部门的关系,发行人和投资者的关系,如何充分利用现有的金融市场法规和金融市场结构,以及会计准则调整和投资者保护等。本文还分析了资本弱化结构,建议在公募REITs中予以细化规定。     

公募REITs释放基建投资新活力

2021年6月21日,中国首批公募基础设施证券投资基金(简称公募REITs)上市,共有9单公募REITs试点项目分别在上海证券交易所(5单)、深圳证券交易所(4单)上市交易.中国证监会债券部相关负责人表示,经过多年探索,公募REITs从基础设施领域找到着力点,探索出一条符合中国国情的实现路径,这是资本市场贯彻落实新发展理念,积极回应中国经济"转型升级"的集中体现.     

房地产投资信托基金的税法困境与改进路径

文章梳理了房地产投资信托基金的勃兴与问题,从类REITs法律结构、类REITs税收制度分析了我国类REITs的法律结构及其税法困境与成因,并借鉴美国、日本、新加坡REITs税收制度的成功经验,提出构建完善的信托税收体系、确立税收中性与税收穿透的基础性地位、出台针对REITs产品的专项税收法律法规、制定适当的税收优惠或税收递延政策等我国REITs税收制度改进的相关政策建议。     

公募REITs信息披露责任配置制度研究

中国证监会发布基础设施领域不动产信托基金相关的通知和指引标志着公募REITs试点阶段的开始.公募REITs制度特别强调信息披露,并在发行期和存续期都规定了较为详细的信息披露要求.但是现有公募REITs信息披露制度并未规定相关主体之间的信息披露协同和衔接,不同主体之间的信息披露责任划分也不明确.我国公募REITs复杂的交易结构、双重委托代理困境而产生的信息不对称及利益冲突,需要我国公募REITs进一步明确不同主体信息披露责任配置.公募REITs信息披露制度,应当以信息生成和传递过程中不同主体产生的法律关系为分析基础,具体化项目管理人及其主要负责人信息披露责任、加强基金托管人的监督职能,在公募REITs年度报告责任主体中应当包含专项计划管理人等其他管理人.     

日本公募REITs发展借鉴

2021年6月底,在经过多年的酝酿后,中国公募不动产投资信托基金(REITs)9只产品正式上市.公募REITs的推出是一项重大金融工具创新.但我国公募REITs市场容量较小,相关配套政策仍待出台.境外REITs市场发展成熟、规模较大,鉴于日本公募REITs在规模发展、国际化程度、运行机制等方面的优势,本文对日本REIT...     

Liquidity dynamics across public and private markets

In this paper we investigate cross-asset liquidity between equity markets and REITs and between REITs and private real estate markets. While many studies have investigated REIT liquidity, and there is an emerging interest in liquidity in the private real estate markets, there appears to be little knowledge of the dynamics of cross-market liquidity. We find lower levels of liquidity for REITs compared to a set of control firms matched on size and book-to-market ratios. Commonality in liquidity is also lower for REITs than the controls and the overall market. However, we do find an important difference in share turnover for REITs, which appears to have a higher level of commonality than found in other studies. We suggest that this may be due to the financial crisis. Additionally we find evidence of similar time-series variation in liquidity for public and private real estate markets. We also find significant directional causality for most liquidity proxies from the public to private real estate markets. Finally our results show that there is strong contemporaneous correlation between both public and private real estate market liquidity and the term spread and real investment and consumption spending. REIT liquidity measures based on intraday data also appear to contain important information not found in measures constructed from daily returns.     

城镇公共设施投资体制改革及其财政政策选择

随着我国城镇化速度的加快,城镇发展对公共设施建设提出了巨大的需求,迫切需要以市场化、社会化为主要方向,改革城镇公共设施投资管理体制.针对公共定价、市场监管、投资方式等新问题,在财政政策领域,政府需要采取调整财政投资范围、配合公共设施服务市场监管、有效控制城镇财政债务风险、调整投资管理权限、积极推动公共设施投资方式改革等措施,完善公共设施投资管理体制,提高服务水平与质量,增进城镇居民福利水平.     

The Riskiness of REITs Surrounding the October 1997 Stock Market Decline

Real estate investment trusts (REITs) are viewed as low risk/low return stocks that exhibit defensive stock characteristics. The stock market decline of October 1997 provides an excellent opportunity to examine the riskiness of REITs during high levels of market uncertainty. We find that the decline in REIT stock values was about one-half as large as the decline of non-REIT stocks. Additionally, market uncertainty on the event day was shown with an increased bid-ask spread for all stocks. On the following day when the market decline was partially reversed, the bid-ask spreads continued to increase for non-REIT stocks, but declined for REIT stocks. This suggests that REITs, like defensive stocks in general, are less prone to significant declines during market-wide disturbances. Also, we order stocks based on the standard deviation measures of risk and show that this risk measure explains the cross-section of returns for non-REITs but is not valid for REITs.     

Do Alternative Real Estate Investment Vehicles Add Value to REITs? Evidence from German Open-ended Property Funds

Besides the more commonly used REITs, German investors can also invest in a lesser-known real estate vehicle, Open-ended Property Funds. OPFs are considered a compromise between listed and direct real estate investments. OPF fund managers generally provide daily (perfect) liquidity. However, if liquidity falls below 5%, share redemptions in these funds can be temporarily suspended for a period of up to two years. During this time, investors will only be able to sell shares on the secondary market (exchange), and are thus subject to significant liquidity risk. The objective of this paper is to analyze whether OPFs add value to investor portfolios above that provided by REITs. We show that OPFs have a diversification advantage over REITs in low-risk portfolios, despite their larger potential liquidity risk. REIT liquidity is comparable to that of ordinary common stock, but OPFs exhibit an average initial discount to funds’ NAV of about 6% when share redemptions are temporarily suspended. However, in the long-run, this potential redemption suspension does not negatively influence OPF performance (in case OPFs reopen again). This makes OPFs an attractive investment alternative to REITs for investors who have a high level of risk aversion and a long-term investment horizon, such as endowments, insurance companies, and pension funds.     

The Performance of REIT-owned Properties and the Impact of REIT Market Power

Using a unique, detailed panel dataset of lodging properties, this paper tests whether properties owned by real estate investment trusts (REITs) perform differently than other properties and whether the concentration of real estate ownership brought about by REITs has increased market power. Our results demonstrate that REIT-owned properties, which are primarily mid-scale and high-end hotels, did not perform significantly better, on average, than other mid-scale or high-end hotels in the same geographic area. However, because of the superior overall performance of mid-scale and high-end hotels, REIT properties as a whole did perform better, on average, than non-REIT properties. From these results we conclude that the superior performance of REIT properties was due to the fact that REITs tended to acquire properties in market segments that performed well; REIT ownership in itself does not appear to have increased performance. Our results also suggest that the superior performance of the market segments in which REITs have a significant presence is not attributable to the market power of the REITs.     

The Variation of Economic Risk Premiums in Real Estate Returns

We examine the predictable components of returns on stocks, bonds, and real estate investment trusts (REITs). We employ a multiple-beta asset pricing model and find that there are varying degrees of predictability among stocks, bonds, and REITs. Furthermore, we find that most of the predictability of returns is associated with the economic variables employed in the asset pricing model. The stock market risk premium is highly important in capturing the predictable variation in stock portfolios, and the bond market risk premiums (term and risk structure of interest rates) are important in capturing the predictable variation in bond portfolios. For REITs, however, both the stock and bond market risk premiums capture the predictable variation in returns. REITs have comparable return predictability to stock portfolios. We conclude that there is an important economic risk premium for REITs that are not captured by traditional multiple-beta asset pricing models.     

Creditworthiness or Management Signal? An Empirical Investigation of Loan Commitments Obtained by Non-taxable Firms

Market reaction to the announcement of obtaining loan commitments (LCs) is examined for a unique sample of tax-exempt real estate investment trusts (REITs). Debt-interest tax incentives may be ruled out on a theoretical basis and empirically due to a significant positive market reaction. Thus, evidence is developed to differentiate between two signaling-effect explanations. The analysis supports the hypothesis that management procures LCs to undertake new real estate investments. This action is interpreted by the market as a signal of managements superior information regarding the REITs true equity value.     

Responses of REITs index and commercial property prices to economic uncertainties: A VAR analysis

We use market participants’ perceived uncertainty to investigate the response of real estate investment trusts index (REITs Index) and commercial property prices to shocks in economic uncertainty. Using US quarterly data and applying a vector autoregression (VAR) model, our results show that an increase in market participants’ perceived uncertainty leads to a significant drop in the REITs Index and commercial property prices. In addition, we show that the REITs Index responds quicker to the uncertainty shocks than the commercial property prices. Our findings provide important implications for investors.     

REIT Stock Splits and Market Efficiency

An analysis of real estate investment trust (REIT) stock splits is presented. Evaluation of the initial reaction to split REITs supports efficient market pricing where REITs generate statistically significant positive announcement date returns, no statistically significant record date returns, and muted ex-date returns. In the long-term, split REITs do not consistently out perform benchmark portfolios over one-year, two-year, and three-year periods. REITs split subsequent to a substantial run up in stock price and to improve the position of their post split stock price relative to the stock price of the typical REIT.