M.Stanley to complete $6 bln property fund-sources

HONG KONG/NEW YORK, March 31 (Reuters) - Morgan Stanley (MS.N) is close to raising $6 billion for a new global property fund, falling short of its earlier target of $10 billion, sources with direct knowledge of the plan said.

The Morgan Stanley Real Estate Fund VII Global, the latest in a series of its international property investment funds, originally targeted to raise $10 billion, Reuters reported in September. [ID:nSHA301627]

The bank decided to reduce its fund-raising target late last year due to a poor global market environment and the fund-raising work for the new real estate fund is expected to be completed soon, said the sources with direct knowledge of the plan.

On Monday, Reuters reported U.S. private equity firm the Carlyle Group [CYL.UL] was raising its second Asia real estate fund with a target of $1 billion in a move to tap more property deals in key markets such as China and Japan. [nHKG127589] (Reporting by George Chen in HONG KONG and Megan Davies in NEW YORK, Editing by Jacqueline Wong)