We are comparing American Assets Trust Inc. (NYSE:AAT) and Taubman Centers Inc. (NYSE:TCO) on their dividends, institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, profitability, risk, earnings and valuation. They both are REIT – Retail companies, competing one another.

Valuation & Earnings

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
American Assets Trust Inc.	325.66M	8.73	20.09M	0.43	97.84
Taubman Centers Inc.	645.56M	6.57	75.12M	1.24	42.36

We can see in table 1 the earnings per share (EPS), top-line revenue and valuation of American Assets Trust Inc. and Taubman Centers Inc. Taubman Centers Inc. has higher revenue and earnings than American Assets Trust Inc. Currently more expensive of the two stocks is the business with a higher price-to-earnings ratio. American Assets Trust Inc.’s current price-to-earnings ratio is higher than that of Taubman Centers Inc., which means that it is the expensive of the two.

Profitability

Table 2 provides the net margins, return on equity and return on assets of the two firms.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
American Assets Trust Inc.	6.17%	2.4%	0.9%
Taubman Centers Inc.	11.64%	-746.1%	1.8%

Volatility and Risk

American Assets Trust Inc. is 76.00% less volatile than Standard and Poor’s 500 because the company has a beta of 0.24. Competitively, Taubman Centers Inc. is 35.00% less volatile than Standard and Poor’s 500, because of the 0.65 beta.

Dividends

American Assets Trust Inc. pays out its dividends annually at $1.08 per share and 2.46% dividend yield. The dividend yield for Taubman Centers Inc. is 5.26% while its annual dividend payout is $2.59 per share.

Analyst Recommendations

In next table is delivered American Assets Trust Inc. and Taubman Centers Inc.’s ratings and recommendations.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Rating Score
American Assets Trust Inc.	0	0	2	3.00
Taubman Centers Inc.	1	4	1	2.17

American Assets Trust Inc.’s average price target is $45, while its potential upside is 1.97%. On the other hand, Taubman Centers Inc.’s potential upside is 23.76% and its average price target is $61. The results from earlier shows that analysts view suggest that Taubman Centers Inc. seems more appealing than American Assets Trust Inc.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

0.4% are American Assets Trust Inc.’s share owned by insiders. Competitively, Taubman Centers Inc. has 0.4% of it’s share owned by insiders.

Performance

Here are the Weekly, Monthly, Quarterly, Half Yearly, Yearly and YTD Performance of both pretenders.

	Performance (W)	Performance (M)	Performance (Q)	Performance (HY)	Performance (Y)	Performance (YTD)
American Assets Trust Inc.	0.14%	7.28%	7.26%	11.71%	8.37%	9%
Taubman Centers Inc.	-0.85%	-4.89%	-15.43%	-7.15%	-10.56%	-19.78%

For the past year American Assets Trust Inc. has 9% stronger performance while Taubman Centers Inc. has -19.78% weaker performance.

Summary

Taubman Centers Inc. beats American Assets Trust Inc. on 11 of the 16 factors.

Taubman Centers, Inc. operates as a real estate investment trust. As of June 30, 2005, the company owned a 63% managing general partnerÂ’s interest in The Taubman Realty Group Limited Partnership (the operating partnership). The operating partnership engages in the ownership, management, leasing, acquisition, development, and expansion of regional retail shopping centers and interests therein. As of August 23, 2007, it owned and/or managed 23 urban and suburban shopping centers in 11 states the United States. These centers are located in metropolitan areas, including New York City, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Denver, Detroit, Phoenix, Miami, Dallas, Tampa, Orlando, and Washington, D.C. The operating partnership also owns certain regional retail shopping center development projects, as well as approximately 99% of The Taubman Company LLC, which manages the shopping centers and provides other services to the operating partnership and to the company. Taubman Centers qualifies as a REIT under the Internal Revenue Code. As a REIT, the company would not be subjected to federal income tax to the extent it distributes at least 90% of its taxable income to its shareholders. Taubman Centers was founded in 1950 by A. Alfred Taubman and is headquartered in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan.