All is quiet on New Year’s Day. So says rock band U2. For some, however, the beginning of 2015 has not been calm. On Thursday, Hong Kong-listed Chinese property developer Kaisa revealed that it was in default on a loan from HSBC. Repayment of the $52m debt, due on December 31, was triggered by the early December resignation of company chairman (and big shareholder) Kwok Shing Ying.
The default is the latest piece of bad news for Kaisa, which has lost four senior executives in the past few weeks. Just before Mr Kwok’s resignation, the company said authorities in Shenzhen had restricted most of its operations in that city, which contributes about a fifth of the company’s expected sales for this year. There has been no explanation for the restriction. Kaisa announced on the same day that shareholder Sino Life had bought an 11 per cent stake from the controlling Kwok family for $215m, taking the insurer’s holding to nearly 30 per cent.
Shares in Kaisa were closed for the first trading day of 2015 having halved in December. The last closing share price of HK$1.59 values the company at about one-third of its book value. The MSCI China property index trades just below par.