Joseph Lau shows deft hand at managing stock portfolio
Venerated 'Stock God of Asia' Lee Shau-kee has a new challenger to his throne: Joseph Lau Luen-hung (below).
The Chinese Estates chairman yesterday brought good news to his shareholders by announcing that the company had sold all its saleable securities, making HK$3.65 billion in net profit. That translated into a return of almost 45 per cent on its total portfolio of HK$8.15 billion, or a profit of about HK$10 million a day.
Just six months ago, the medium-sized property firm booked a HK$1.44 billion realised gain but sat on HK$2.54 billion of mark-to-market losses. Chinese Estates has thus made an amazing turnaround of nearly HK$5 billion at a time when most companies are reeling under the meltdown.
Actually, there have been signs that Chinese Estates was on the comeback trail. Last month, Mr Lau awarded his staff up to 10 per cent of issued shares. Two weeks later, he bought the entire stake of Chinese Estates from The Children's Investment Fund for HK$1.03 billion, or about HK$6 per share.
Chinese Estates yesterday closed 0.91 per cent lower at HK$8.72.
