Hong Kong’s Henderson Land Sees Earnings Fall by Half and More Asia Real Estate Headlines

Henderson Land leads Mingtiandi’s headline roundup today, with the blue-chip developer reporting a profit plunge aggravated by Hong Kong’s weak office market. Also making the list, Champion REIT sues an upscale Hong Kong gym chain over unpaid rent and Chinese data centre firm GDS seeks loans for its Malaysia build-out.

Weak Hong Kong Market Pulls Henderson Land Earnings Down by Half

Hong Kong developer Henderson Land’s first-half earnings nearly halved as a subdued office property segment continued to weigh on office rents amid high interest rates, geopolitical tensions and a changing retail landscape, the company’s chairmen said.

Profit fell 47 percent year-on-year to HK$3.17 billion ($407 million), reflecting a fair value loss of HK$2.26 billion after revaluation of the group’s investment properties, Henderson said in a stock filing after trading hours on Wednesday. Fair value loss in the year-earlier period was HK$116 million. Read more>>

Champion REIT Sues Hong Kong’s Pure Fitness Over Unpaid Rent

A Hong Kong gym chain frequented by the city’s financial elite faces a lawsuit from a landlord alleging missed rent payments.

Pure Fitness is being sued for missed payments of rent and management fees at its facilities in ICBC Tower and Champion Tower in the central business district, a court filing shows. It owes HK$12.7 million ($1.6 million) excluding interest, according to the claim by CP (SH) Ltd. Read more>>

GDS Seeking $2.3B in Loans for Malaysia Expansion

GDS Holdings is considering raising MYR 10 billion ($2.3 billion) in loans for its data centre operation in Malaysia, people familiar with the matter said, in what would be some of the largest financing for such a project in Asia.

GDS is working with banks to arrange for the borrowing that will be used to build out operations of its unit GDS International in Malaysia, the people said, asking not to be named discussing a private matter. The Shanghai-based company is also considering an initial public offering of the unit as soon as next year, the people said. Read more>>

PwC China Warns Clients to Expect Six-Month Ban

PwC China has informed its clients that it expects a six-month business ban by Chinese authorities as early as September as part of punishment for its audit of collapsed developer China Evergrande, the Financial Times reported Wednesday.

The ban would prevent it from signing off on financial results and initial public offerings and from conducting other regulated activities, the report stated, citing multiple clients. Read more>>

India’s Embassy REIT Signs Mega-Lease With Commonwealth Bank of Australia

India’s Embassy REIT has inked an agreement with Commonwealth Bank of Australia to lease 800,000 square feet (74,322 square metres) of prime office space in Bengaluru’s Embassy Manyata with an expansion option of an additional 600,000 square feet.

Sources said market rents are around INR 100 per square foot and they normally lease at a premium too, given their large business ecosystem offering. Read more>>

China Vanke Expects First Half-Year Loss in Over 30 Years

China Vanke is poised to make its first half-yearly loss since the Chinese property giant went public over 30 years ago, and many other listed Chinese developers have said they too expect to be in the red as the country’s real estate market remains in the doldrums.

Vanke is bracing for losses of between RMB 7 billion ($981.1 million) and RMB 9 billion in the first six months due to the shrinking scale of development, a narrowing gross margin and investment losses, the Shenzhen-based firm said. A year ago it raked in a profit of RMB 9.9 billion. Read more>>

Mainland Plan for Government Homebuying Off to Slow Start

Slow implementation is hampering China’s RMB 300 billion ($42 billion) plan to have local governments buy up unsold flats to help troubled developers, blunting the effect of a programme that was already seen as too limited to improve the fortunes of the country’s troubled property sector, according to analysts.

While a growing number of Chinese cities have said they will support the plan after Beijing’s announcement of the relending facility in May, precious little progress has been made, with only about five cities actually making purchases so far, according to a China Real Estate Information Corporation report on Monday. Read more>>

China’s Kaisa Group Expects H1 Net Loss of Up to $1.4B

Chinese developer Kaisa Group said Thursday that it expects to report a net loss of RMB 8.8 billion ($1.2 billion) to RMB 9.8 billion for the half-year ended 30 June, hurt by a decline in property deliveries and higher impairment provisions set aside for projects.

China’s property sector, a key driver of the economy, has been in turmoil since 2021, with housing sales plummeting 6.5 percent in 2023 from the previous year and 35.9 percent from the 2021 peak, following a regulatory crackdown on high leverage among developers that sparked a liquidity crisis. Read more>>

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