Owners of Times Square, Fashion Walk malls report big losses as Covid-19 crisis prompts plea for rent relief

‘I have never seen a time like this,’ says property mogul Ronnie Chan, chairman of Hang Lung, which owns the Fashion Walk and Peak Galleria shopping centres

Stephen Ng, chairman of Wharf Reic, said landlords are struggling as badly as tenants during the Covid-19 crisis after shops, restaurants and cinemas called for help

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Shoppers on face masks walk through a virtually deserted Harbour City shopping mall in Tsim Sha Tsui. Photo: Sam Tsang

Published: 8:00am, 31 Jul 2020Updated: 12:07pm, 31 Jul 2020

Two of Hong Kong’s biggest commercial landlords, Hang Lung and Wharf Reic, posted huge losses in the first half of the year as Covid-19 “destroyed the global economy” and condemned retail sales to 17 straight months of decline.

The disappointing results for the two mall owners came as organisations representing restaurants, shops and cinemas issued ultimatums to their landlords to help their plight by cutting rents.

Seasoned property mogul Ronnie Chan, chairman of Hang Lung Properties, said the impact of the health pandemic, on top of last year’s social unrest and what he described as the “cold war” between the US and China, has been unprecedented.

“I have been in this [property] industry for 40 years. I have never seen a time like this,” said Chan at a results briefing on Thursday. “I am not sure whether [social unrest] will return. China and the US have waged a war. These will be very bad for business.”

Ronnie Chan, chairman of Hang Lung Properties, said the current crisis is ‘unprecedented’. Photo: Jonathan Wong

He said it was too early to tell whether Hang Lung, which owns the Fashion Walk and Peak Galleria shopping centres, should “embrace the bear market” and make new investments.