Real estate vultures Colony and Apollo slash IPO deals by half

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Vulture real estate investors Tom Barrack and Leon Black are finding it harder than they thought to sell the public on joining them.

Barrack’s Colony Financial Inc. and Black’s Apollo Commercial Real Estate Finance both slashed the size of their planned initial public stock offerings today in half.

Both companies, set up as real estate investment trusts, plan to invest in troubled commercial real estate debt, betting on making a killing in the long run by taking advantage of distressed borrowers.

But rivals of Barrack and Black have had the same idea, and the market seems to be choking on a glut of such REIT offerings.

I have more in this post from earlier today on Colony’s planned IPO.

-- Tom Petruno