Morgan Stanley Real Estate Investing, the fund manager's property arm has recently purchased Metropolis Shopping Mall located in northwestern Moscow. The deal is being called Russia's largest commercial real estate purchase in history.

The mall has a total size of 205,000 square meters is one of the biggest shopping areas in the country. It was acquired by MSREI from Capital Partners. The real estate developer tagged the price at US$1.2 billion according to some sources.

In a formal statement, "The acquisition of the Metropolis Shopping Center is the largest ever transaction in the Russian commercial real estate market." There were no terms released on the sale. According to MSREI, the mall is visited by 55,000 people a day in 2012 and is acknowledged as one of the busiest in the region.

The deal comes at an opportune time, where the country is at a spending boom and the economy is continuously growing due to increasing commodity prices.