A dozen years ago, Prologis (NYSE: PLD) was created in a consolidation that kicked off a growth spurt, and the San Francisco-based real estate investment trust (REIT) has now become the largest owner of industrial properties on the planet. It's a total return that not only smokes two frequently cited benchmarks for REIT performance -- the CRSP US REIT Index and the S&P 500 itself -- but it just barely trails the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite over that time.