Fosun Returns to UK Market with $426M Deal for London Office Complex

China’s Fosun International, is preparing to close a £300 million ($426.4 million) deal for a London office complex, according to a report today in Reuters.

Should the deal for Thomas More Square, a 566,000 square foot (52,500 square metre) tower in eastern London be finalised, it would be Fosun’s second acquisition of a London real estate asset, and the first since billionaire Guo Guangchang’s mainland investment conglomerate entered into a joint venture with the UK’s Resolution Property last year.

The pending transaction would also be the first major cross-border acquisition for Fosun since Guo was detained by Chinese authorities in connection with an alleged corruption investigation in Shanghai during December last year.

Buying Rupert Murdoch’s Forrmer Headquarters

The current owner of the 1990-vintage commercial development is the UK’s largest REIT, Land Securities, which began marketing the 10 building complex in August last year. At the time, Land Securities’ asking price was said to be £300 million.

The freehold campus includes six office buildings and 13,000 square feet of retail space in four smaller buldings, according to an account in CoStar.UK. The complex occupies a 4.2 acre site in the city’s Wapping area, and was formerly the home of Rupert Murdoch’s News Limited.

Land Securities bought out the Ontario Teacher’s Pension Plan Board’s 50 percent stake in the asset in November, 2014 for £85.3m and now owns the property outright.

Is Fosun Back in Acquisition Mode?

Should Fosun be able to finalise this sale, it could signal a return to the cross-border acquisition business for one of China’s most active investors.

In addition to buying Lloyd’s Chambers in London for £64.5 million in 2013, Fosun has bought properties in Australia, Italy and the US, including a $725 million deal for One Chase Manhattan Plaza in 2013, a New York complex that Fosun has since renamed 28 Liberty.

The conglomerate has also been active in buying up insurance companies and other financial providers overseas, including Meadowbrook and Ironshore in the US, and Portuguese insurer Caixa Seguros in early 2014.

However, all of this deal-making appeared to have come to a complete stop in early December, when Guo was grabbed by police officials in Shanghai’s airport.

In August 2015, Guo was found by a Shanghai court to have had improper business relationships with Wang Zongnan, the former chairman of state-run department store chain Shanghai Friendship Group, as well as the former head of Shanghai-based SOE Lianhua Supermarket Holdings and Shanghai Bailian Group.

Wang was sentenced to 18 years in prison in August for misappropriating RMB 195 million in funds from the SOEs he managed.

While Guo was released from custody within days of being detained on December 11^th, since that time his company has struggled to complete cross-border deals. During December Fosun dropped its pursuit of London merchant bank BHF Kleinwort Benson, and then in February the investment firm abandoned its plan to acquire Israeli insurer Phoenix.