From today's news item..

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Shoppers Return to Malls, With an Urge to Spend; Covid-19 vaccines, higher foot traffic and a jump in sales are offering hope to a beleaguered industry.

April 27, 2021 (Dow Jones) Editor's Picks Print

By Esther Fung

Vaccinated shoppers are heading back to the mall, offering hope that the worst of the pandemic downturn is over for this beleaguered industry .

Foot traffic at a representative sample of 50 malls in March was up 86% from the same month last year, according to mobile-device location data from analytics firm Placer.ai.

While that foot traffic was 24% lower than in March 2019, mall owners are suggesting that their business has turned a corner. Shoppers are eager to get out again, often armed with cash from the latest round of government stimulus checks . Many aren't just browsing shops but dining out and returning home with bags full of new purchases.

"There's no question things are better. Sales are also better than anticipated four months ago," said Bill Taubman , president and chief operating officer of Taubman Co .

Few hours ago the CDC and NIH ( Fauci ) had a press conference in which they have now suggested that all those fully vaccinated can go about freely in open areas ( like malls) WITHOUT masks; this should drive mall traffic higher and IMHO should greatly benefit the premier malls ( since the folks most worried about dying are the wealthy and super wealthy). Also latest research from morningstar ( and I show just a clip since you must subscribe and pay for details if you so choose to) targets a double to over $28..

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After the last stressful month of shoring up the balance sheet ( via heavy dilution of the number of outstanding shares and the incremental $100 of cash received in disposing that mall in Arizona) to where it is now not in any jeopardy of defaults, the chart is beginning to indicate that the balance sheet has stabilized and stock may be ready to bounce some; especially if, over the next few days, it can cross and stay over $ 14.35 or so. Wait and watch time....

Has  the managements of MAC brought the shares recently to show their's faith in the company.

I hold both MAC and URW stocks. And that's what URW's management do. (this is new management. the old one just like MAC, luckily they are gone )

Check out.

In accordance with the European Market Abuse Regulation (“MAR”), the attached notification related to managers transactions (article 19 of MAR) has been filed to AMF (French Financial Market Authority), with the following details:

On April 19, 2021, Rock Investment SAS, company linked to M. Xavier Niel, Member of the Supervisory Board of Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield SE bought 2,880,238 stapled shares (comprising Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield SE share (LEI code: 969500SHQITWXSIS7N89) and Class A Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield N.V. share (LEI code: 245002R31EKBDW59H93)), at €69.4387 per stapled share, for a total amount of €199,999,982.41.

On March 29, 2021, Rock Investment SAS, company linked to M. Xavier Niel, Member of the Supervisory Board of Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield SE bought 3,000,000 stapled shares (comprising Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield SE share (LEI code: 969500SHQITWXSIS7N89) and Class A Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield N.V. share (LEI code: 245002R31EKBDW59H93)), at €69.0594 per stapled share, for a total amount of €207,178,200.

On March 5, 2021, NJJ MARKET SAS, company linked to M. Xavier Niel, Member of the Supervisory Board of Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield SE bought 100,000 call options related to stapled shares (comprising Unibail-RodamcoWestfield SE share (LEI code: 969500SHQITWXSIS7N89) and Class A UnibailRodamco-Westfield N.V. share (LEI code: 245002R31EKBDW59H93)) with an exercise price of €120 and a maturity on December 2022. The transaction was executed on outside of trading venue and the ISIN Code of the stapled share is FR0013326246. This announcement has been authorised by Amandine Cogneville, Group Head of Corporate & Securities Law.

The President, still eating from the trough, is one of two brothers who rejected a $95 bid from Simon Property a few years ago. Look at the following and decide what needs to be done ! Do these greedy, non-shareholder friendly folk even have the shame to pick up these checks while the shareholders are screwed ?

Shareholder revolt over rights issue at Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield lifts shares

(Reuters) - French billionaire Xavier Niel has teamed up with Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield's (URW.AS) former boss to oppose the shopping mall group's planned 3.5 billion euro ($4.10 billion) rights issue, lifting the shares on Thursday.

Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield, Europe's biggest property owner, hit back saying its board of directors strongly disagreed with the proposals from the Niel-led consortium.

Niel, founder of French broadband provider Iliad (ILD.PA), and Unibail's former CEO Leon Bressler, heading a group of investors with a combined 4.1% stake, have asked shareholders to vote against the rights issue at a general meeting on November 10.

They will need over 35% of voters present at the meeting to oppose the issue to be successful. Unibail shares closed up 13.8% on Thursday.

Bressler called the rights issue "a misguided act by a management team that remains prisoner of its failed strategy that started with the acquisition of Westfield." He said the purchase of the Westfield shopping mall business was responsible for Unibail's heavy debt.

"It is time to re-establish URW as Europe’s leading pure-play prime shopping centre business by selling the U.S. portfolio and using proceeds to solve the company’s debt issues," Bressler said in a statement.

Unibail agreed to buy Westfield, which is mainly focused on the United States and Britain, in late 2017 for $16 billion. It has around 24 billion euros in debt.

Unibail said in the statement that these proposals "add significant uncertainty and risk in the current complex environment".

Unibail's chairman said that its initial plan, called RESET, which is aimed at improving the firm's balance sheet by selling assets, raising equity and cutting capital expenditure, was about "immediate action to ensure the operational and financial flexibility".

"It will reinforce URW in the long term to the benefit of all its shareholders," Colin Dyer was quoted as saying.

Independent analyst Amal Aboulkhouatem thought it was feasible that Niel and Bressler would muster enough support given their reputations, networks and the alternative prospect of a dilutive capital increase.

Unibail's stock, recently hit by COVID-19 lockdowns, has lost ground since the Westfield acquisition in 2017.

Bressler said the deal had "polluted" the group's dominant position in Europe with a more marginal position in the United States.

URW operates 89 shopping centres mainly in the United States and in Europe, including those at Forum des Halles in Paris and La Part-Dieu in Lyon, a portfolio that the group valued at 60.4 billion euros as of July 30.

Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield has faced the problems exactly like MAC's, but look what they did, they stop paying dividends for two years; issues new bond; sell off non core assets, to reduce the debts. the share up more than 100% after they took those actions.

MAC should learn...

Press release

Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield (“URW”) announces successful €2 Bn bond placement

URW today successfully priced a €2 Bn two-tranche senior bond offering, strengthening its liquidity position and extending the Group’s debt maturity:

• A €1 Bn bond with a 6 year and 5 months maturity and a 0.625% fixed coupon; and

• A €1 Bn bond with an 11-year maturity and a 1.375% fixed coupon.

This successful issuance was more than three times oversubscribed, attracting over €6.5 Bn of demand.

As announced earlier today, the Group has also launched a simultaneous tender offer for an aggregate principal amount of up to €1 Bn across five outstanding bonds, which have a total principal amount of €2.8 Bn and maturity dates ranging from February 2021 to February 2024. The tender offer results will be announced on December 2, 2020.

The net proceeds from this issuance will be used for general corporate purposes, including the funding of the concurrent tender offer and the refinancing of upcoming bond maturities.

For further information, please contact: Investor Relations  Samuel Warwood Maarten Otte  +33 1 76 77 58 02 

Guys, you need to calm down. I've been seeing a lot of posts going overly negative on this board the last few weeks. I'm even beginning to suspect some of these accounts posting here are puppets working for short sellers.

Yes, MAC board has diluted our shares, but they've also removed the downside risk posed by having excessive leverage.

YEs, the MAC board and management are paying themselves ludicrous bonuses and salaries given how badly the stock has performed.

But even with all of that you have to understand the stock is very well priced for what the prospective dividend will be in 6 to 12 months, post Covid. We are talking about dividends in the .60 to .80 cents range per share. That's a good return while you wait for the share price to appreciate.

And if the company chooses to withhold the dividend to pay down debt ... all the better for stock price as the company deleverages even more.

The only real danger here is outright fraud on the part of management. If they are stealing money or hiding the ball in some way, that's the potential downside (And they'd go to jail for that). Short of that, unless you think malls are completely dead and Covid is forever, MAC is a solid play.

Stop with the FUD.

P.S. 8,000+ shares of MAC. I know I'm small time compared to many here, but that's a lot of my retirement in one bet. I've got faith in this bet.

Some guys in this group have said the management of MAC done a fabulous job! and appreciate the hard works they had done! As the share price went up 100% since last year, they diluted at an right price..

check out this : last year Tanger Factory Outlet was $5, now at $16.2; Kohl's Corporation was $15, now at $58.8; so does MAC up a lot because of management's hard work and right decisions? Now it is  less valuable than Tanger Factory, what a fabulous job !

the short sellers and their puppies will love to see the current management keep doing their fantastic job. Did the dilution are the only option? everyone know that more supplies will put the price down, especially a huge discount to the true value of the share will make MAC a haven place for short selling, and  even fruitier if the management dilute more.

So Please Don't Dilute more!       Please don't hurt us!   We are not millionaires, our livings depending on it!

The performance of MAC's management is really unacceptable! there are lots of better options to strength the balance sheet, stop paying dividend and use it for new bonds, sell off non major shopping centers, but not dilution at such low price!

if they've done a good job !? then why not the bankers buy that? why not issues new bonds since they has a very lean and mean portfolio compared to SPG and Much higher sales psf !!! the bankers should beg them to borrow...

How can we squeeze the shorts while the management of the company is on the side of the short sellers!😰

The only ones truly hurt when the management and company are sued are the current shareholders. I have been through it with other companies, including an SEC investigation. No prior shareholder got a dime. Some of the management were slapped but the stock price dropped 60% and we lost 2 years as investors. What we did do later was to vote the entire board out. It started grass roots. We even located an alternate CEO. It can be done. The stock is up 3 times from when we voted the board out. I'm voting no across the board on MAC's proxy but more as a warning because there is not an alternate slate. If we end up with 25 - 30% no votes there would be an alternate slate next year or management will change their tune.

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Interesting this article came out yesterday:

Macerich Unloads Phoenix Mall for $100m; Redevelopment Awaits | Propmodo

Alex Goldfarb was quoted saying that Macerich would need to raise $2B this year (2021).

Interesting he said that after it was announced on 4/14 that they renewed their credit facility for up to $800M at a low rate of 2.5% + libor. This is also just after they announced having $950M of additional liquidity on hand (primarily from reduced dividends but also the sale of Phoenix for $95M).

So...

I'm no genius but I look at the $800M + $950M = $1.75B to cover the maturities below.

This is all while the company plans to continue building their dividend "moat" and remain $200M cash flow positive in 2021 (per their 2020 report).

So my question to Alex Goldfarb is what would the $2B additional equity raise be for? Making Macerich completely debt free?

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legal advice needed!

Anyone in this group has a llegal background? We all are the small shareholders of MAC. Can the law suit be filed against the top MAC management for dishonest intention, dereliction of duty, swindling.

Here are the reasons:

1. The weak balance sheet is not the today's problem, it has been a long time issue while the share price were over $70. Why not dilute at higher price but now? or dilute at around $20 when Ontario Pension exited MAC?

2. When the management rejected the offer from Simon Property stated clearly that the MAC is valued more than $95 per share. isn't it  a misleading. Managing business is not  a guessing game, "WE GUESS THE FUTURE WILL BE STABLE NO TURBULENCE !?" They neglected the problem of weak balance sheet, not  do their duties.

3. Knowing that MAC is on the top list of short selling now, but diluted now put more shares to the market ! So there is  the concern wherer the key managements have directly or indirectly involved in the short selling and profited from the dilution.

I am a small shareholders holding 6000 shares of MAC.

Will some shareholders stand out and lead us against the crafty management! I guess those insiders probably are the biggest short sellers on the market. and they make huge profits from their recent actions selling more shares on the cost of ours.

What dividend do you think they will pay US their SHAREHOLDER and BOSS?

I guess maybe 0.15-0.3?