中国房地产业狂欢结束

'Swagger Is Gone' For Developers

就在半年前，中国的房地产开发商们还沉浸在一场采购狂欢之中，一门心思想着如何大肆举债以尽可能多地屯积更贵、更多的土地。

然而转眼间一切都变了。

进入今年第一季度，这些开发商已陷入重重围困之中。一方面，中国许多关键市场的房地产价格开始显露颓势；另一方面，资本市场也对开发商们的融资需求报以冷脸。眼下中国的物价涨速之快乃近10年来所仅见，为了抑制通货膨胀，中国政府正大张旗鼓地遏制银行新增贷款。

去年大肆举债的那些公司如今都陷入了周转不灵的窘境，无法去开发他们先前屯积的土地。更要命的是，政府也在收紧套在开发商脖子上的绞索。今年初，政府表示要动用税收和行政没收等手段打击屯积土地的行为。

众达国际法律事务所(Jones Day)驻北京的大中华区建筑及工程争议解决业务主管艾浩利(Ashley Howlett)表示，房地产业耀武扬威的日子已经结束。他透露，最近几个月中国客户一直在向他征询寻找替代融资渠道的意见，例如找一家国际房地产基金合资成立私人股权投资公司，或是从外资银行那里争取信贷额度。

恒大地产集团有限公司(Evergrande Real Estate Group Ltd.)便是这场“环境骤变”中的最新一个牺牲者。该公司原打算通过在香港首次公开募股(IPO)筹资22亿美元，但上周却宣布暂缓上市，理由是“市况波动”。

恒大地产上市搁浅折射出许多中国开发商如今面临的困境。尽管股市动荡不安，但负债累累的开发商除了寻求上市外却别无选择。恒大地产原准备将上市融资的一半以上用来为去年的疯狂置地买单。

恒大地产在招股说明书中称，本公司债务比例过高，现金流状况恶化会对公司的偿债能力和持续经营构成实质性的不利影响。不过该公司并未透露暂缓IPO后如何筹措资金。

即便是实力雄厚的公司也不得不抑制一下自己的扩张雄心。香港市值最大的中资房地产开发商──碧桂园控股有限公司(Country Garden Holdings Co. Ltd.)在去年末取消了15亿美元的发债计划，到今年1月份恢复该计划时，发债规模只有原来的三分之一，而且还改为成本高许多的可转债。

而北京的商务楼和住宅开发商SOHO中国有限公司(Soho China Ltd.)也因为国内股市走软而在最近放弃了A股上市计划。该公司董事长潘石屹接受《上海证券报》采访时表示，中国房地产公司将“进入前所未有的融资艰难期”。

在资本市场蒸蒸日上和房价飞速上涨的鼓舞下，去年中国房地产业掀起了一场圈地热。德意志银行(Deutsche Bank)驻新加坡分析师托德•舒伯特(Todd Schubert)称，去年的那种“模式”是建立在房价涨速超过地价涨速的基础上的。

当时房地产公司越是积极圈地，就越是能得到投资者青睐，这便鼓励了开发商不计成本地不断增加土地储备。舒伯特称，如今房价上涨受阻，同时资金来源日渐匮乏，游戏也该结束了。

那些极度扩张并且负债累累的开发商正在四处筹措建设资金。艾浩利称，某些情况下，开发商反倒被自己屯积的大量土地所拖累。

如果在几个月前，他们也许还有机会从资本市场捞上一把。据Thomson Financial的统计，2007年大陆房地产业在香港上市共募集资金76亿美元，是2006年的七倍。而且中国监管部门似乎也愿意向大陆开发商敞开上市的大门。然而随着股价不断下滑，投资者信心受挫导致开发商的上市计划与其他行业的IPO一道陷入风雨飘摇之中。与此同时，到海外市场发行美元债券的路也不好走。

坏消息并不止于此。中国房价泡沫经过多年的膨胀后，开发商将遇到一场大范围的房价逆转，特别是在许多大开发商盘踞的华南地区。中国的超级开发商──万科企业股份有限公司(China Vanke Co.)董事长王石在最近几个月出人意料地将新楼盘价格大幅下调。他最近还在电视访谈节目上建议大家等3、4年后再买房。

为了抑制房价，去年中国政府提高了购买第二套住房的抵押贷款首付比例并上调了房贷利率，导致购房成本增加。此外，政府还推出了限价房，这会进一步助长房价的回落。

中国海外发展有限公司(China Overseas Land & Investment Ltd.)董事长孔庆平上周承认，在上述各种因素的影响下，今年中国房地产业将进入困难时期。不过他认为，某些一线城市房价回落多达三成不过是此前几年房价过度上涨后的“理性回归”，而不是王石所称的“拐点”。

在前景难测的情况下，投资者开始更仔细地审视开发商们的财务状况。领盛投资管理(证券)(LaSalle Investment Management Securities)副总裁杨书健(Victor Yeung)称，投资者寻找的是那些资金充裕、且项目开发链条能不断带来新收入的公司。领盛投资管理(证券)持有95亿美元的全球房地产股资产。

杨书健表示，一些资本充裕的开发商将免受市场大滑坡的冲击，并在其他同行陷入困境时取得发展优势。在中国超过五万家房地产开发商中，上市的不过几十家。而这些众多的开发商大部分是只经营一两个项目的小公司，他们在国家抑制信贷的政策影响下是最不堪一击的。

标准普尔(Standard & Poor)驻香港副总监符蓓在2月27日发布的房地产开发商评级报告中称，许多中国的房地产开发商将在今年受到打击，虽然标普仍看好这个行业的长期前景，但许多规模小、资金少的公司将无法度过这场寒冬，享受不到未来的果实。

中国资金实力最为雄厚的开发商之一中国海外发展有限公司表示，准备通过收购、协议转让和合资等方式在今年增加土地储备。该公司H股价格在周二上涨9.7%，报12.68港元（合1.63美元）。在标普的评级中，该公司的财务评级处于中国开发商中最高之列。

花旗投资研究(Citi Investment Research)中国房地产业分析师Tony Tsang将中国海外发展和另一家全国性的大型开发商华润置地有限公司(China Resources Land Ltd.)列入了自己的推荐股名单。他表示，在政策紧缩时期，全国性的大型公司仍有能力实现稳健增长，而其他小开发商则可能成为牺牲品。

JUST SIX MONTHS ago, Chinese property developers were on a shopping spree, dipping deep and borrowing heavily to snap up more, and more expensive, pieces of land.

How quickly things have changed.

Three months into 2008, China's property developers are under siege. Property prices are showing signs of weakness in many of the country's key markets, and capital markets have all but seized up for these -- and other -- offerings. The Chinese government is on a high-profile campaign to clamp down on new bank loans, hoping to curb inflation, rising at its fastest clip in a decade.

Companies that leveraged big last year are now strapped for cash, unable to build on the land they have accumulated. Beijing is breathing down their necks, having pledged earlier this year to tax and seize hoarded land.

'The swagger is gone,' says Ashley Howlett, a Beijing property lawyer with Jones Day who heads the firm's greater-China construction practice. In recent months, he says, Chinese clients have been approaching him for ideas on alternative sources of funding, such as forming a private-equity joint venture with a global property fund or taking out a line of credit with a foreign bank.

The latest casualty of changed conditions: Guangzhou-based developer Evergrande Real Estate Group, which last week shelved an initial public offering it hoped would raise as much as US$2.2 billion. It cited 'continuing volatility' in capital markets.

Evergrande's woes illustrate many of the headwinds facing Chinese developers. Despite stock-market turmoil, the developer was so weighed down by debt it had no choice but to take a crack at an IPO: More than half the funds Evergrande was hoping to raise were set aside to pay for plots it accumulated during a furious land grab last year.

'We are highly leveraged and a deterioration of our cash-flow position could materially adversely affect our ability to service our indebtedness and to continue our operations,' Evergrande wrote in its listing prospectus. With the IPO shelved, the company hasn't said how it will seek funds.

Even giants have had to trim their ambitions. Country Garden Holdings, the largest Chinese property developer by market capitalization on Hong Kong's exchange, canceled a US$1.5 billion debt issue late last year before resuscitating it in January -- though only at a third of the size, and restructured as a far more expensive convertible bond.

Soho China, a major commercial and residential developer in Beijing, recently dropped the idea of doing a domestic stock listing amid souring market conditions. Pan Shiyi, the company's co-founder and chairman, told Shanghai Securities News that Chinese developers this year will 'find themselves in extraordinarily difficult financial straits.'

Fueled by buoyant capital market and soaring property prices, developers went on a land-buying binge last year. 'The 'model' that worked in 2007 was predicated on prices for apartments growing faster than land costs,' says Todd Schubert, an analyst with Deutsche Bank in Singapore.

Companies that bought land aggressively were rewarded by investors, which only encouraged developers to keep increasing land banks, no matter how high the cost spiraled. Now, with home prices faltering and funding sources scarce, Mr. Schubert says, 'this game is over.'

Overextended and overleveraged developers are struggling to find construction funds. 'Having a lot of land in some ways becomes an albatross around your neck,' says Mr. Howlett of Jones Day.

Months ago, they might have gone to the capital markets. Mainland property companies raised US$7.6 billion in Hong Kong listings in 2007 -- seven times the 2006 total, according to Thomson Financial. Chinese regulators seem willing to allow mainland property concerns to sell shares, but as stock prices continue to plummet, poor investor sentiment can put those plans in jeopardy, along with IPO ambitions in other sectors. Meanwhile, the market for offshore U.S. dollar debt is moribund.

There is more. After years of frothy price growth, these developers are also facing the prospect of a turning point in China's broader property market, especially in the south, a stronghold for many of the biggest developers. In the past few months, Wang Shi, the head of megadeveloper China Vanke, a Shenzhen-listed company based in that boomtown, surprised the market by slashing prices heavily on new flats and suggesting in a recent television interview that people wait three to four years before purchasing a new home.

The government made home buying more expensive last year by raising down-payment rates on second mortgages and raising mortgage rates, in order to cool prices. It also is rolling out low-income housing that could further depress prices.

Kong Qingping, chairman of Hong Kong-listed China Overseas Land & Investment, acknowledged last week that this confluence of trends would make the year ahead difficult for Chinese developers. He described price declines of as much as 30% in some top-tier cities as simply a 'return to rationality' after several years of overexcitement, not a 'turning point,' as Mr. Wang of China Vanke has it.

Still, with the future uncertain, investors are taking a closer look at developers' balance books. They seek companies with ample cash and a pipeline of projects to produce new revenue streams, says Victor Yeung, a vice president in Hong Kong for LaSalle Investment Management Securities, which has a US$9.5 billion global property-stock portfolio.

Mr. Yeung says some of the better-capitalized developers should be insulated from a sharp market downturn, and positioned to take advantage of others' hardships. Though listed China developers number in the dozens, there are more than 50,000 developers -- mostly tiny outfits with one or two projects that make them most vulnerable to Beijing's crusade to restrict bank lending.

'This will be a bruising year for many Chinese real-estate developers,' wrote Bei Fu, a Standard & Poor's associate director in Hong Kong, in a Feb. 27 ranking of the developers it rates. 'While we stand by our positive long-term outlook on the sector . . . many small, cash-strapped companies will not survive long enough to reap the benefits.'

China Overseas Land, one of the best-capitalized Chinese developers, says it plans to expand its land bank this year through a combination of takeovers, negotiated deals and joint ventures. The company's stock price surged 9.7% Tuesday to HK$12.68 (US$1.63). With a market capitalization of about US$12.5 billion, the company sits atop S&P's ranking of financially fit developers.

Tony Tsang, an analyst who covers Chinese property for Citi Investment Research, picks China Overseas Land and China Resources Land, another big developer with a nationwide footprint, as his favorites. In a time of policy tightening, he argues, 'big-cap players with a nationwide positioning have still been able to achieve decent growth, possibly at the expense of other smaller developers.'