February 9, 2012 – Two U.S. companies now own significant stakes in the real estate investment trust that owns Hotel Sax and other commercial property at Marina City.

According to documents filed on Thursday with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, The Vanguard Group, Inc., an investment management company in Malvern, Pennsylvania, has purchased 9,029,571 shares of stock in LaSalle Hotel Properties. The amount represents 10.77 percent of all of LaSalle’s outstanding shares.

A New York company, meanwhile, BlackRock, Inc., now owns 8,148,705 shares of LaSalle stock, representing 9.73 percent of outstanding shares.

Both companies have been among LaSalle’s largest investors since at least last fall and since that time, both have nearly doubled the number of shares they own in LaSalle.

Vanguard manages $1.65 trillion in U.S. mutual funds, according to its website. BlackRock, located on East 52nd Street in mid-town Manhattan, has $3.5 trillion in a variety of investments.

According to NASDAQ, 241 institutions own 85,111,760 shares of LaSalle stock, the price of which closed at $27.42 on Thursday.

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