China Overseas shelves mainland listing plan
By Hui Ching-hoo (HK Edition)

China Overseas Land and Investment Ltd will suspend the plan of selling shares in A-share market to pave the way for the float of its parent group) - China State Construction Engineering Corp next March, Chairman & Chief Executive Kong Qingping said.

"We will temporary put our A-share listing plan on hold until our parent group completes its flotation, which will probably be finalized by next March," he told a group of reporters in Shenzhen yesterday.

Though Kong did not specify the timeframe for China Overseas and Investment's A-share listing, he inclined to carry out in the form of CDR (Chinese depository receipt).

"We discussed the issue with Shanghai bourse before and they supported the proposal," he said.

Speaking about the land acquisition, Kong said the company had replenished 2 million square meters new lands in the first four months this year.

"We have already exceeded half of our whole year target of 3 million square meters. The newly-added lands cost us about 5 billion yuan. We expect to spend another 3 billion to reach our goal," he said.

The company currently has property projects in 15 mainland cities. Kong said the company would continue to expand over Bohai Sea Rim region.

On the central government's tightening land supply, he said the measure would precipitate additional cost in acquiring new lands.

"We have strength in bidding the projects under demolition because of the company brand. We are able to keep the cost at competitive level," he said.

The company has set its capital expenditure at 18 billion yuan this year, 8 billion of which will be used in land acquisition.

(HK Edition 05/18/2007 page6)