NEW YORK (Reuters) – The Official Stanford Investors Committee and the court-appointed receiver of Allen Stanford’s financial empire have sued Antigua and Barbuda, the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank and 23 former Stanford Financial Group Co executives, accusing them of assisting in the financier’s $7 billion Ponzi scheme.

The committee is seeking at least $90 million of transfers to Antigua, according to the complaint filed on February 15 in U.S. Federal Court in Dallas. It also is seeking punitive damages. It accuses Antigua and Barbuda of shielding Stanford’s activities in exchange for loans that were not repaid and real estate.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Nike Inc said on Monday it has no plan to run future ads using Paralympic athlete Oscar Pistorius, charged with murdering his girlfriend, after the South African became the sporting goods maker’s latest sponsored athlete to face trouble.

“Nike has no plans for Oscar Pistorius in upcoming campaigns,” KeJuan Wilkins, a Nike spokesman, said in an email.

NEW YORK, Feb 18 (Reuters) – The owner of magazine Reader’s
Digest, once the staple of doctors’ offices and coffee tables,
has filed for bankruptcy for the second time in less than four
years, citing a greater-than-expected decline of the media
industry.

RDA Holding Co and more than two dozen affiliates filed for
a pre-negotiated Chapter 11 bankruptcy plan the company says
will allow it to reduce its $534 million debt load by 80
percent, according to documents filed Sunday in U.S. Bankruptcy
court in the Southern District of New York.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Two midtown Manhattan skyscrapers owned by international real estate firm Hines are up for sale, according to a source familiar with the deal, as sales of New York office buildings show signs of heating up.

Hines, a privately owned, Houston-based real estate investment manager and developer, is selling 499 Park Avenue, the former headquarters of Bloomberg LP and the current headquarters of financial company Cantor Fitzgerald, said the source, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the sale.

Feb 13 (Reuters) – Much of Blackstone Group LP’s vast
U.S. real estate holdings may be bought by, or turned into, real
estate investment trusts over the next couple of years, the head
of the private equity group’s global real estate division said
on Wednesday.

Jonathan Gray said U.S. capital markets, particularly the
bond market, has opened its arms to real estate investment
trusts, making it likely that much of its U.S. holdings of
offices, homes and hotels will be bought by existing REITs or
become REITs though initial public offerings.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc has agreed to sell 237 Park Avenue, a 21-story Midtown Manhattan office building, to RXR Realty and Walton Street Capital LLC, the winning bidders said on Tuesday.

The purchase price is $820 million, two sources familiar with deal said.

The pending sale comes just months after Lehman agreed to sell its biggest property holding, apartment owner Archstone, to AvalonBay Communities Inc (AVB.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) and Equity Residential (EQR.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) for $6.5 billion plus the assumption of debt.

OSLO/NEW YORK, Feb 11 (Reuters) – Norway’s $700 billion oil
fund made its first property purchase in the United States on
Monday and plans to spend billions more this year enlarging its
portfolio, its real estate chief said.

The fund, the world’s biggest sovereign wealth fund, bought
a minority stake in a portfolio of five properties for around
$600 million from U.S. asset manager TIAA-CREF and is looking
for more, it said in a statement.

NEW YORK, Feb 5 (Reuters) – Apartment owner Equity
Residential reported a key earnings measure that missed
Wall Street’s forecast and issued lower-than-expected forecast
for the year, despite reporting higher rent and low expense
growth in the fourth quarter.

Equity Residential, whose chairman and founder is real
estate mogul Sam Zell, said on Tuesday that fourth-quarter funds
from operations (FFO), excluding one-time items, rose to $243.9
million, or 75 cents a share, from $204.6 million, or 65 cents a
share, a year ago.

By Ilaina Jonas

(Reuters) – Simon Property Group Inc (SPG.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) reported a 21.9 percent increase in a key earnings measure for the fourth quarter, easily beating analysts’ estimates, as rents and sales rose at its malls and outlet centers.

The company, the No. 1 U.S. mall and outlet center owner, also raised its dividend on Monday for the sixth straight quarter.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Time Warner Inc is considering selling its New York headquarters and has asked real estate brokers to evaluate the building’s value, in a move that could see it relinquish one of the last vestiges of its disastrous merger with America Online, two sources said.

One source said on Wednesday that the company could still hang on to its portion of the Time Warner Center, a complex that Chief Executive Jeff Bewkes once called an “indulgence.”