The 39 Conduit Road luxury apartment building, developed by Henderson Land, is now the focus of a police investigation and media attention after the developer said last month most of the sales deals have fallen through. Edmond Tang / China Daily

Govt seeking 'clearer explanation' for the 'unusual' business practice

The Hong Kong police are investigating 20 failed sales of luxury apartments at Henderson Land Development's Mid-level project, 39 Conduit Road, for possible faked transactions, Secretary for Transport and Housing Eva Cheng told legislators Monday.

Speaking at the Legislative Council (LegCo) Housing Panel's meeting, Cheng admitted that "the incident is an unusual one that needs a clearer explanation, and the authority has reasons to conduct investigations." She added that the police authority will examine whether these cancelled transactions have involved deception. She pledged that the authority will dig out the truth.

However, Cheng declined to give the timetable for completion of the police investigation, saying only that the investigation will be completed within a "reasonable" time frame.

The LegCo Housing Panel agreed to conduct another meeting on July 12, 2010 in which the representatives from the Transport and Housing Bureau, the Lands Department and Henderson Land will be invited to attend the meeting.

Cheng reiterated that the administration will not tolerate any deceitful activities in property transactions and it will do its utmost to restore information transparency in local property transactions.

Henderson Land filed seven documents to the LegCo on Monday to explain the cancelled transactions involving 20 luxury apartments at its 39 Conduit Road project. As the developer does not require confidentiality for the release of these documents, the administration also released to the LegCo correspondences with Henderson Land.

The announced sales of these luxury apartments at astonishingly high prices drew public concern last October when the blue-chip property developer announced one of the duplex units was sold at a world-record of HK$71,000 per square foot of gross floor area.

According to the documents, Henderson Land purportedly sold 25 luxury flats last October. But the completion of transactions for 24 apartments was delayed until mid-June, when the developer said that transactions for 20 apartments had been cancelled.

According to the documents, Henderson Land said that the buyers of these 20 failed transactions involved 20 different overseas shell companies that were controlled by four persons. The buyers signed the sales contracts with the developer from October 11 to October 16, 2009. Then these purchasers decided to cancel the deals on June 11 and June 14, 2010.

As a result, Henderson Land retained the deposits for the 20 units, which is 5 percent of the apreed prices, but decided against pursuing the rest of the deferred payment through legal action.

The Land Department queried why Henderson Land did not seek penalties against the buyers over breach of contract and described this practice as "unusual".

Henderson Land explained that it does not believe that the purchasers' assets can cover the losses because they are only shell companies. In addition, the developer sees strong prospects for the local luxury property market. Therefore, they prefer to re-launch offerings of those flats rather than pursuing legal actions against the failed buyers, according to the documents.

LegCo members To Kun-sun and Lee Wing-tat from the Democratic Party argued that the incident may involve connected transactions between Henderson Land and the property buyers that need thorough investigation. Chan Kam-lam from the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong and independent legislator Shek Lai-him maintained that these are private business transactions and that the LegCo should not step into the inquiry until the administration finishes the investigation.

China Daily

(HK Edition 07/06/2010 page3)