Guo banks on social media never making him ‘unreachable’ again

“It’s taken us 25 years to move one kilometre from where we began,” muses Guo Guangchang from Fosun’s new head office, called The Bund Finance Center – a new financial quarter built near the waterfront of Shanghai’s old town.

Designed by Foster and Partners – the British company behind HSBC’s headquarters in Hong Kong among countless other flagship creations, and Heatherwick Studio, the development includes two 180-metre landmark towers containing offices, a boutique hotel and retail spaces.

Guo spends a week in month in Shanghai, where his office offers a panoramic view of the Huangpu River. It’s important he does so, for when you are the chairman of a major Chinese listed company, there is a value in being visible.

On the day we meet, the share price of Shanghai Fosun Pharmaceutical Group Co, had tumbled almost nine per cent in Shanghai and seven per cent in Hong Kong, thanks to online chatter speculating that Guo was unreachable – a euphemism for the government detaining somebody for financial crimes investigation.

Investors were reminded of the time in December 2015 when Guo was out of the public eye for a few days to help with what his communications people later described as “financial judicial investigations”.

This time, Guo was simply stuck in the Shaanxi provincial capital of Xi’an, where he had been delivering a speech to the local chamber of commerce. With his private jet unavailable, Guo had to fly commercial and was delayed getting back home.