DTZ bucks the trend
Three firms of global property agents made stock market announcements recently. CBRE and JLL reported significant improvements to their trading performance for the third quarter while DTZ issued a warning that their year end figures would show a loss rather than a previously forecasted profit. CBRE was boosted by its Far Eastern operations while JLL cited a strong uptake in its US business.
The DTZ announcement caught almost everyone in the industry by surprise. Although it is non-existent in the US, it has a well established and successful Asian operation. The company said that its UK regional office network was a major factor and that a paucity of transactions in the provincial markets had eaten in to its overall performance. This is unlikely to change given that these are the areas most likely to be hit by the government’s spending review . We hope another staff cull isn’t on the cards.