NewKenny Chan thrives in new role with Hong Kong’s Future Land Development

Kenny Chan, a financial expert with 10 years experience behind him, was appointed as Executive Director and Vice President of Future Land Development in March 2015.

In less than a year, he has successfully helped the company realise a shift in its listing from China’s B-share market to the A-share market and issue an offshore US$250 million bond with a much lower cost.

Before his current job, Chan was Chief Financial Officer of mainland developer Times property and a manager at KPMG. He talked to Property Post about Future Land’s financing plans and future strategies.

Q: With more domestic financing channels opening up, how would Future Land adjust its financing structure?

A: We are very cautious on our lending. Though we issued domestic corporate bonds, domestic private bonds and offshore bonds this year, those were used for redemption of our existing development loans (that have a higher interest rate) and offshore high yield bonds, rather than for real estate investment, so the company’s leveraging was actually down.

Besides, since we can issue domestic bonds now, we have stopped applications for any development loan, which is “restricted cash” and cannot be freely used. Less restricted cash means less debt. In the future, we hope to use our cash on hand to develop homes.I expect our debt ratio as of the year end will decrease compared to the first half.