Chinese Investors Cast a Broader Net

The Fosun Property Holdings CEO described the four drivers of his company’s activities. (Photo: E. Hautier/Image & Co.)

CANNES, FRANCE—The Chinese investor into commercial property in 2017 is casting a wider net while at the same time bringing a greater depth of understanding to transactions, a MIPIM 2017 audience was told Wednesday. The speaker, Fosun Property Holdings CEO Alex Gong, charted his own organization’s experiences both as an example of broader trends and as an explanation of the group’s particular strategy.

Fosun Property, the real estate arm of Fosun Group, is seeking to diversify its portfolio outside of China, in common with many larger Chinese players. In the case of Gong’s organization, the portfolio is still largely domestic, with 80% of Fosun Property’s real estate holdings in 33 major Chinese cities. That level of concentration has Gong “worried”—not about the quality of the real estate, but about the percentage that is tied up in an increasingly competitive, and expensive, domestic market.