Hei-ming Cheng (right) and friends seem to be having a great time
At the top of our tour around the web today, Cheng Hei-ming’s Kailong seems to be on a roll, quadrupling the size of its open-ended renminbi fund just under a year after entering a strategic partnership with Warburg Pincus. Also in the headlines, Country Garden promises to pay back mainland buyers of its Malaysian homes, and Marks and Spencer discovers that department stores don’t make any more sense in China than they do in most other places. Read on for all these stories and more.
Kailong Plans to Quadruple Size of its Open-Ended China Fund
Chinese real estate private equity firm KaiLong plans to enlarge the size of its first renminbi-denominated open-ended fund by nearly four times in view of the positive property market in China.
“We established the first open-ended fund in China by the end of last year, targeting income generating assets with an initial asset under management of 3.8 billion yuan (US$552 million),” said founder and chief executive Cheng Hei-ming. Read more>>
Country Garden Pledges Refund for Forest City Buyers
Country Garden Holdings, whose Forest City project in Malaysia is the biggest overseas project by a Chinese property developer, said it will refund money to mainland investors caught up in Beijing’s escalating crackdown on capital outflows.
The move is the latest consequence arising from Beijing’s tighter policy on capital controls, with most Chinese developers engaged in selling overseas properties now forced to shift their focus from mainland buyers to other countries. Read more>>
Chinese-Backed Group Buys 5th Aussie Shopping Centre
Chinese-backed company Real Asset Management Group has snapped up The Broadway Plaza in the western Sydney suburb of Punchbowl, taking its local retail property empire to almost $150 million.
The property was sold by receivers PPB Advisory for $41.2m and adds to the group’s holdings in regional NSW and Queensland. Read more>>
Marks and Spencer’s Final Mainland Closeout
When news of the closure Shanghai’s last Marks and Spencer store on Saturday reached Mary Zhou, she felt a pang of sadness, before rushing out to pile a trolley high with discounted trousers.
“It’s a great shame, I buy all my clothes here,” the 51-year-old school teacher said, as she hunted among the few clothes racks remaining at the company’s flagship store on Shanghai’s equivalent of Oxford Street. “I love their style. Not too modern, and not too out of date.” Read more>>
Wanda Offers 40% Rebate For Films Shot at Qingdao Studio
Projects that shoot at the Movie Metropolis in Qingdao receive a 40 percent rebate; ‘Pacific Rim 2’ and ‘Godzilla 2’ are already taking advantage of the incentives.
The biggest development in the international incentives arena is offered at Chinese conglomerate Dalian Wanda Group’s estimated $8 billion studio in Qingdao, China. As Wanda announced at a splashy event in Los Angeles last fall, projects that shoot at the Wanda Movie Metropolis receive a 40 percent rebate, bankrolled by the regional government and Wanda from a development fund worth $750 million to be spread over five years. Read more>>
Beijing Cracks Down on Sales of Homes Under Commercial Titles
Property developers are facing a potentially huge dent in their sales in Beijing after the municipal government declared war on residential apartments being sold on land intended for commercial use.
As part of a broader campaign to curb the capital’s frenetic home buying and skyrocketing prices, the Beijing authorities on March 26 banned all sales of new apartments built on plots that were originally acquired as commercial or office land. Read more>>
Tune in again tomorrow for more news, and be sure to follow @Mingtiandi on Twitter, or bookmark Mingtiandi’s Linked page for headlines as they happen.
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