(19-09-2014, 04:37 PM)jaykay Wrote: I am a believer. I am in the same boat with Towkay.
Towkay is not God, he is human like you and me, he can screw up too, I hope you keep that at the back of your mind....
noted but he is too smooth that even bankers are convinced... even fundies are convinced that those who need to track the index have little choice but to buy both F&N and FCL despite the still thin free float of 12%...
I rather trust Charoen than some train wreckers that keeps steering into troubled China housing markets and remain convinced that they are ok...
Now that you mentioned China property... why do towkays like Kuok, Peter Lim and esp Wee Ee Chao see in Yanlord?
Wee will buy in whenever prices weaken.
Wee is from a banking background... If you remember how UOB financed Robin Lau on Goldhill Sq in the 80s, I think they have done their due d on what they are eyeing...
Post the Pan Elec crisis in the 80s, over-leveraged Robin Lau went bust and Robin Lau's flagship Robina house went to City Dev and sprawling Goldhill went to UOL and stayed with UOL since to be renamed United Sq. United Sq then became UOL's cornered stone asset in the Newton/Novena area when they have Novena Sq right across the road.
Yanlord is a niche developer and there is a good track record. If I m not wrong, it is trading at a discount to RNAV. However with Godfathers backing Yanlord, they could well be hedging small parts of their assets in a high risks but essential part of the big Chinese economy. You are welcome to follow them if you have faith in them.
(19-09-2014, 04:37 PM)jaykay Wrote: I am a believer. I am in the same boat with Towkay.
Towkay is not God, he is human like you and me, he can screw up too, I hope you keep that at the back of your mind....
noted but he is too smooth that even bankers are convinced... even fundies are convinced that those who need to track the index have little choice but to buy both F&N and FCL despite the still thin free float of 12%...
I rather trust Charoen than some train wreckers that keeps steering into troubled China housing markets and remain convinced that they are ok...
Now that you mentioned China property... why do towkays like Kuok, Peter Lim and esp Wee Ee Chao see in Yanlord?
Wee will buy in whenever prices weaken.
Wee is from a banking background... If you remember how UOB financed Robin Lau on Goldhill Sq in the 80s, I think they have done their due d on what they are eyeing...
Post the Pan Elec crisis in the 80s, over-leveraged Robin Lau went bust and Robin Lau's flagship Robina house went to City Dev and sprawling Goldhill went to UOL and stayed with UOL since to be renamed United Sq. United Sq then became UOL's cornered stone asset in the Newton/Novena area when they have Novena Sq right across the road.
Yanlord is a niche developer and there is a good track record. If I m not wrong, it is trading at a discount to RNAV. However with Godfathers backing Yanlord, they could well be hedging small parts of their assets in a high risks but essential part of the big Chinese economy. You are welcome to follow them if you have faith in them.
GG
Thanks GG. I do have some at $1. Took a small bite when the towkays went it with Aberdeen (who sold off subsequently). May be a long term stock now.
(20-09-2014, 04:38 PM)touzi Wrote: How does one buy the FCL Bond? Will it be traded on SGX? Thanks.
It is not a retail bond.
WB:-
1) Rule # 1, do not lose money.
2) Rule # 2, refer to # 1.
3) Not until you can manage your emotions, you can manage your money.
Truism of Investments.
A) Buying a security is buying RISK not Return
B) You can control RISK (to a certain level, hopefully only.) But definitely not the outcome of the Return.
NB:-
My signature is meant for psychoing myself. No offence to anyone. i am trying not to lose money unnecessary anymore.
If anyone thinks that Charoen is mad, then the Chinese are from out of this earth... even City Kwek is also actively looking to venture down under looking at Leighton's non core property holdings. It appears that only C and K are missing out due to Temasek's strategic focus on China...
Greenland Holding’s Zhang Yuliang and the Chinese property investment push
THE AUSTRALIAN SEPTEMBER 19, 2014 12:00AM
Greg Brown
Property Reporter
Sydney
Yang Huiyan’s company, Country Garden, is entering the local market with the $500m Ryde GYang Huiyan’s company, Country Garden, is entering the local market with the $500m Ryde Gardens project. Source: Supplied < PrevNext >
••••
ZHANG Yuliang, the chairman of one of China’s biggest property development companies, isn’t shy about his ambition to leave a major mark on the Australian skyline.
The businessman, who runs Fortune Global 500 company Greenland Holding Group from Shanghai, is aggressive in his determination to expand the group’s local presence. “Australia is very important to us,” says Zhang. “Besides the four projects that we have already here, which are worth over $1.4 billion, we are now discussing some other projects. We expect our investments to get bigger.”
Zhang is one of a host of Chinese property tycoons who has poured money into Australian property development in the past two years, often paying a premium to outbid local groups for sites. China’s richest woman, 33-year-old heiress Yang Huiyan, has led Country Garden into Sydney’s North Ryde with a $500 million project, while Shaoqun Tan’s company, Fuxing Huiyu Real Estate, is launching $550m worth of apartments in Parramatta in the city’s west.
The most recent cashed-up entrant is China’s richest man, Wang Jianlin, who is estimated by Forbes magazine to be worth more than $US16 billion. His Beijing based company Dalian Wanda Group announced last month that it would create a $1.7bn Australian arm, to be seeded with a 55 per cent stake in the $1bn three-tower Jewel apartment and hotel complex on Queensland’s Gold Coast. Wanda’s joint-venture party in the project is another Chinese company, the Ridong Group from Zhuhai in Guangdong province.
Zhang’s Greenland, which is owned by an arm of the Shanghai city government, has been on the tip of the tongues of most property players since it arrived in the local market less than 18 months ago. In its first project, the group is turning an ageing Sydney CBD office building into the city’s tallest residential tower worth $600m. It is also preparing to launch the sales for two suburban Sydney projects and aims to build up to 1500 apartments on a site it bought next to Melbourne’s Flemington racecourse. The company has also teamed up with James Packer’s Crown Resorts to bid for the chance to develop the multi-billion-dollar Queens Wharf casino, hotel and apartment project in the Brisbane CBD. The Queensland government will choose the winning party by the end of the year.
Born in Shanghai in 1958, Zhang was the director of the residential department of the Shanghai government’s agricultural committee before setting up Greenland Development in 1992 with funds from the city government, which still owns 51 per cent of the company. He has been at the helm through the company’s 22-year rise. Last year it reaped a global revenue of about $55bn. Zhang is not afraid to weigh in on Australia’s debate about foreign buyers locking locals out of the market. “Being a wise country (Australia) should be open towards the world. New York, Los Angeles and London are all facing the same problem (of high house prices) and they are all open towards (foreign buyers). This is where the charm of the cities are and is a normal requirement for the market. China and Australia have a strong complementary economic situation, which is why the Australian government should be more open towards Chinese investors.”
Peter Arkell, chairman of the Australian Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai, says Chinese business leaders make decisions for long-term gain, more so than Australian leaders, which is why it may appear that Chinese groups often overpay for Australian development sites. “It may appear at times to be bullish but I think there is something more considered about this. If we are looking at an acquisition we might think, ‘Oh god, they paid over the odds for that’. But that’s in the context of today’s prices without a view or an understanding of the (companies) long term (plans).”
The arrival of Wang Jianlin’s Dalian Wanda Group this year represents another big step forward for Chinese investors here. The well-connected Wang is the vice-chairman of the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce and has been a member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, a political advisory body to the central government, since 2008. He served as deputy to the 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China in 2007, under then-president Hu Jintao. Forbes says the Wanda Group owns 71 Wanda shopping plazas and 40 five-star hotels in China. Last year, Wang flew in Hollywood stars Nicole Kidman, Catherine Zeta-Jones and John Travolta to launch an $8bn Oriental Movie Metropolis in the Chinese coastal city of Qingdao.
CBRE’s Richard Butler, who has sold local property to Chinese buyers for more than 20 years, says there has been a big push for Chinese companies to internationalise over the past three years. “They are extremely forward thinking in their desire to spread their equity around the world. These groups are often comfortable with Australia because of educational ties.” Butler says that Chinese property leaders take long-term relationships very seriously. “If you get their confidence they’ll deal with you time and time again. You don’t just say: ‘Here is a property, buy it.’ You say: ‘Here is a property and this is the profit you’ll make for these reasons’, so that they buy again and again and again.’’
There are economic reasons for the recent global spread of Chinese property companies. Groups such as Greenland and Wanda grew into multi-billion-dollar empires on the back of China’s rapid urbanisation over the past two decades. The movement of about 300 million people from the regional areas to the cities sparked a boom in apartment development, and property and related services grew to make up more than 16 per cent of gross domestic product, around double the rate of the Australian economy. But the Chinese residential market is slowing, and companies that are eager for the same growth trajectory are looking abroad.
According to data released by Capital Economics, home sales in China dropped close to 18 per cent in the year to July while unsold apartments in new developments increased by 25 per cent. The Australian market, meanwhile, has continued to improve, with Sydney and Melbourne in the midst of an apartment boom, with prices in the year to June increasing by 15.6 per cent and 9.3 per cent respectively, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics.
Shaoqun Tan, the chairman of Fuxing Huiyu Real Estate, says the Chinese government has actively encouraged big real estate companies to expand overseas so that they can keep growing without overheating the local market. Under the banner Starryland, Tan’s group, which is based in the Chinese province of Hubei, west of Shanghai, entered the Sydney market this year and is developing the $550m Promenade Parramatta apartment project. The apartments range from $399,000 to $900,000, with real estate firm Savills handling the sales campaign. Tan says Australia is the first country in which his company has expanded. “We were drawn to (Australia) by its strong residential real estate market, stunning natural environment and good long-term economic growth prospects.”
Fuxing Huiyu was established in 2001 as the property arm of manufacturing company Hubei Fuxing Science and Technology. “I foresaw the strong future of this industry with China experiencing a large demand for urbanisation as millions of citizens were trying to increase their living standards,” says Tan. “It is certainly evident 13 years later that my career strategy was correct and my property predictions were accurate.” He says he is “motivated by constant progress”. “I get the most satisfaction implementing outside-the-box ideas that ultimately end up proving their value. I like to be constantly challenged.”
Australia’s most prominent apartment builder, Meriton founder Harry Triguboff says Chinese development groups have changed the building landscape over the past two years. He says there is more competition for sites and that the NSW government has responded by releasing more land for development. “On the one hand, we have the problem of having more purchasers, on the other hand we have more supply,” he says. “The fact that we have more (developers) doesn’t worry me because if (a site is stalled for development) I’ve got somebody to sell (the land) to.”
He says, “(Chinese developers in Australia) are just beginning. The big developers will take time to really develop.” He thinks the increase in Chinese developers will be a good thing for Australian cities. “If we didn’t have them the cities wouldn’t grow as fast as they are growing,” he says. But he was tight lipped on sharing advice on how to succeed in the local market. “You’ve got to look what I’m doing and do the same,” he says. Earlier this year, The Australian revealed Triguboff, 81, was considering selling his $6.25bn company to Chinese giant Country Garden. Triguboff said in May: “I am of great value to them — I have all the land.” But it is not yet known whether a deal will proceed.
Yang Huiyan’s Country Garden is based in the Guangdong province, across the border from Hong Kong. Yang, who is worth $7.2bn, has a 70 per cent stake in the company founded by her father, Yang Guoqiang, in 1992. Yang Guoqiang, who built the company from scratch, grew up as a peasant and worked as a bricklayer and construction worker in southern China. He passed control of the company to Yang Huiyan, his US-educated second daughter, in 2005. Two years later it listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, making five of its shareholders billionaires. Yang senior is still the chairman of the company which is ranked 633 on the Forbes Global 2000 list. Just like Greenland, Wanda and Fuxing Huiyu, Country Garden is here for the long haul. It wants to be a major player and like other big Chinese property companies, it has the cash to back it up. Country Garden Australia managing director Johnson Zhang told The Australian the $500m Ryde Gardens project was a “modest” start and it would look at much bigger projects. And what could be bigger than buying Triguboff’s Meriton?
Top 5 owners by shares held Number of shares held Percent of shares held
TCC Assets Limited 1,716,160,124 59.39%
InterBev Investment Limited 824,847,644 28.54%
Geoff Winestock
737 words
19 Sep 2014
The Australian Financial Review
AFNR
English
Copyright 2014. Fairfax Media Management Pty Limited.
When Frasers Property started building a power station to heat, cool and power its Central Park development in Sydney's Broadway, it was supposed to be the flagship for a new trend.
A few years ago, so-called tri-generation plants were held out as a cheap way to cut greenhouse emissions and reduce the need for costly upgrades to electricity networks. Clean power would be generated where it was consumed.
But Scott Clohessy, the project manager, says that as far as he knows, the tri-generation plant he now runs is still unique in Australia and at 2.2 megawatts of capacity it is a lot smaller than was first intended. "It kept getting smaller as the plant developed," Clohessy says.
Three years ago, the City of Sydney launched a $500 million plan to increase the CBDs power generation capacity involving another five sites similar to Central Park. It underwrote a $50 million cheap loan to purchase the tri-generation gas plant which produces electricity and uses the radiant heat to make hot water or power inverters to produce air-conditioning.
This is then pumped around the Central Park precinct as air-conditioning or heating.
But because of the rising price of gas, the axing of the carbon price and regulatory confusion, the economics have changed and plans for a similar tri-generation plant at another major development at Green Square were recently put on ice.
Lance Hoch, chairman of Oakley Greenwood, an energy consultancy, says that tri-generation is just one of a host of "distributed generation" technologies including wind and rooftop solar panels, which are cutting the dominance of the dozen or so large coal-fired plants that previously supplied all the power.
He told a conference on the Eastern Australia's Energy Outlook in Sydney this week that the power grid has still not worked out how to fit them in. "There's a case to remove barriers to accessing the grid for distributed generation but it's very important to understand the costs imposed and the benefits these facilities can provide."Death spiral
He says a key issue is how to calculate the charge for connecting distributed generation to the power grid and what price to pay for any extra power fed back into the grid.
For instance, the feed-in tariffs paid to rooftop solar power households for surplus power which were initially set as high as 45¢ a kilowatt hour have now been wound back in NSW to just 6¢ which is a quarter of the standard price of electricity. Setting costs is harder because many of the power sources are intermittent.
Under one scenario, if there is too rapid a shift to distributed generation, it will leave those still on the traditional grid facing much higher costs to pay for the legacy infrastructure. Innes Willox, chief executive of the AIG, on Thursday warned that the right policies are needed to avoid this "death spiral".
Willox says structural change "may mean much wider take-up of distributed generation, depending on what happens to the costs and performance of solar and batteries. Potential scenarios for an electricity 'death spiral' as customers secede from the grid would be another response, though likely a very inefficient one."
When it was first proposed, the Central Park tri-generation project was expected to be much bigger because it was supposed to ease the pressure on the Sydney city power grid, to upgrade the local network.
But Ausgrid, the local power firm, decided to invest in the Sydney CBD power grid, reducing the need for a big plant at Central Park plant to meet rising demand. Hoch says new national rules that take effect this year will require power networks such as Ausgrid to look at alternative solutions to capacity shortages such as distributed generation before upgrading the network.
Clohessy says Frasers Property supplies heating and cooling to residents on its site at a price comparable to what they would pay for electricity but with a much smaller environmental footprint. The project will soon expand to provide power to a new student housing precinct but network rules make it hard to sell to power to normal residential customers. The fate of distributed generation will also be affected by the decision on whether to maintain the extending Renewable Energy Target which is expected in coming weeks.
Larry Schlesinger
339 words
23 Sep 2014
The Australian Financial Review
AFNR
English
Copyright 2014. Fairfax Media Management Pty Limited.
Australand has secured manchester and homewares retailer Adairs as a tenant in its Key Industrial Park in Melbourne's south-east on a seven-year deal worth just over $600,000 a year.
Adairs, owned by retail entrepreneur Brett Blundy's BB Retail Capital, has leased a new 6680-square-metre office and warehouse facility with 53 car spaces under construction in the Keysborough business park.
Adairs will pay an initial net rent of $90 per square metre for the distribution facility due for completion in October with renewal options for a further 10 years. Adjoining the Adairs distribution centre, Australand is building a speculative facility to capitalise on what it believe is an "undersupply of prime grade industrial space in Melbourne's south east industrial market".
The estimated combined value of both facilities is about $17 million. Australand is targeting a four star Green Star rating for the development.Key tenants secured
The Key Industrial Park covers 41 hectares of distribution warehouses and development land and is 39 kilometres south east of the Melbourne central business district with connections to the Eastlinks toll road and Greens Road interchange.
As of December 2013, Australand had developed 82,000 square metres of warehousing in the business park with a book value of $81.7 million and a capitalisation rate just above 8 per cent. Tenants include BIC, Linfox, TriMas, Sealy and Tyres4U.
Australand GM for its southern region, Anthony Maugeri, said the purpose-built facility would meet Adairs' current and future distribution needs.
"Inquiry levels for our latest speculative facility at The Key are strong," Mr Maugeri said.
Australand is set to be acquired by Singapore-based conglomerate Frasers Centrepoint, which is backed by billionaire Thai brewer Charoen Sirivadhanabhakdi. Frasers closed its $2.6 billion takeover offer of Australand with a 98.39 per cent holding on September 9.
The Australian Financial Review reported that Frasers is thought to be considering a split-up of Australand between its development arm and income-producing assets.
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