A new front is opening in the legal war between the Vatican and groups that managed its real estate investments: in July the Institute for Works of Religion (IOR) moved in the U.S. to sue Optimum Asset Management, a boutique real estate management firm with assets worth €1.5 billion. The U.S. Property I fund, launched by OAM in 2013 and focused on the U.S. real estate market, had raised and waisted $20 million invested by the IOR. According to the Vatican Bank, the decision to take legal action against Optimum now comes after several attempts to obtain responses from the managers that could justify “the substantial zeroing of the investment, despite a particularly favorable U.S. real estate market environment for more than 10 years”. According to the management company, the U.S. Property I sub-fund had initially performed well by investing in hotel, residential, and commercial assets in Miami, New York, and California and distributing dividends. But the effects of the pandemic and rising rates hit U.S. real estate hard - particularly the hotel sector in which the fund invested about 65% of its capital - impacting performance. OAM strongly denies any allegations of mismanagement: for the company, the IOR's request for access is “based on unfounded speculation and not on objective facts”.