Revealed: the mystery man who bought Asia's most expensive flat

The buyer of Asia's most expensive flat has been identified as a company director with a Singaporean passport after Land Registry records for last month were released yesterday.

But it was unclear whether Wang Shuang bought the HK$433.8 million home in Mid-Levels early last month for himself or on behalf of a third party who might never be identified.

The duplex flat is located on the 45th floor of 39 Conduit Road, a building developed by Henderson Land. Wang paid an unprecedented HK$93,000 per square foot for the 4,664 sq ft property, a record for Asia.

Land and companies records show that Wang is a director of a company called Billion Able Corporation. He declared his address on the land record as a flat in Hampton Place, Tai Kok Tsui.

In total, the Land Registry recorded 6,223 transactions last month, including homes, shops, offices and industrial units, a rise of 0.1 per cent from March. But total turnover fell from HK$57.2 billion in March to HK$44.6 billion, a 22 per cent slump.

Some property analysts hinted last month that home sales would continue to decline after the banking regulator tightened mortgage lending rules, locking buyers with smaller budgets out of the market.

Since February, buyers have been able to borrow no more than 60 per cent of the value of homes costing less than HK$7 million, from a loan-to-value ratio of 60 to 70 per cent.

The development in which Wang's flat is located has been at the centre of controversy since as early as 2009. Henderson was condemned for a marketing ploy that saw it skip 48 floor numbers so it could market the top two floors - including the one Wang's flat is on - with the auspicious numbers 68 and 88.

A series of flats went for record prices in 2010 at the height of the global economic collapse - though several of the highly-publicised sales fell through, sparking a police investigation that was eventually dropped last year.