Creditors sell dragon shaped Pangu office tower on Taobao for a steep discount to recover debt owed by fugitive Guo Wengui

Pangu Plaza Tower 5 houses a luxury hotel and IBM China’s office next to the Bird’s Nest Olympic Stadium in the Chinese capital

The 39-storey tower was put on the auction block for a starting price of 5.18 billion yuan and valued at 7.92 billion yuan, about half the average price of comparable Grade A offices in the neighbourhood

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Pangu Tower, a high-rise office building north of the 4th Ring Road, is pictured in Beijing on August 15, 2019. Photo: Simon Song

Published: 10:24am, 20 Aug 2019Updated: 10:37pm, 20 Aug 2019

An iconic Beijing office tower in the shape of a dragon’s head has been sold for a discount during an online auction, as bankers and creditors succeeded on their third attempt to dispose of the asset to recover some of the 3 billion yuan (US$425 million) owed by the fugitive Guo Wengui.

Pangu Plaza Tower 5, which houses IBM China’s office next to the Bird’s Nest Olympic Stadium in the Chinese capital, was sold for 5.187 billion yuan during a 24-hour auction on Taobao, the country’s largest e-commerce platform.

The buyer was Beijing YuCheng Zhiye, according to the auction confirmation document on Taobao’s auction site. According to Tianyancha, a business data search tool in China, it is a Beijing-based property development and management company. A Beijing commercial registry website shows Yucheng is a subsidiary of BBMG Company, a state-owned enterprise. BBMG has China’s biggest cement business in addition to its property development business. Its bond prospectus shows the company had 51.1 billion yuan in total liabilities as of early August. BBMG is listed in Shanghai as well as Hong Kong.

The building, seized from Guo in 2014 after he fled China for the United States to escape a corruption investigation, was put on the auction block for a starting bid of 5.182 billion yuan and valued by Taobao at 7.92 billion, about half the average price of comparable Grade A office blocks in the neighbourhood.

The sale of Tower 5 is a coup for Bank of Shanghai, which is leading a group of creditors seeking to recover the debt owed by Guo, who remains at large in the US even with an Interpol red notice out for his arrest.

An interior view of Pangu Tower 5’s office lobby on August 15, 2019. Photo: Simon Song