It's behind a paywall but take these public short position declaration with a grain of salt - it serves them and their financial positions when it gets media exposure.
Personally, if I were a hedge fund manager, I'd be really careful with this and pick carefully which malls (or rather, the companies that own them) I think are going to fail. The newer, trendy "lifestyle centers" seem to be doing just fine mostly, and even the places like Macy's are still hanging on in some places, just not in others. Macy's isn't going out of business any time soon, but they are downsizing a lot, which means certain locations just aren't viable any more. Even regular malls are still doing OK in many places, but that segment of the market is shrinking.
This morning on his blog, Om Malik wrote this:
> United Arrows is doing retail right — in Japan. A lot more US retails chains should be paying attention to them and their formula. They have 256 stores and yet everyone of them feels special. Everything in their store is thoughtfully and tastefully curated.
I've never been in a United Arrows store, but giving each store it's own feeling seems like the right way to do things today.
Like restauraunts that are empty but insist on charging $20 a plate because that's their 'business model'.. Fill the place up, then raise the price.. if it starts thinning out, lower it.. which is how the 'free market' is supposed to work.. but abstract ownership and financialization shift the actual 'commerce' into participation in equity markets rather than on-the-ground operations...
In my humble opinion, it's a sign of the increasing wealth transfer from the poor to the rich. The middle class is disappearing and it looks like they are taking the Mall away....they realized vast majority just window shop.