Veteran of Greentown gradually steps back from company management

Ask AI · How Will China Communications Construction Group’s Full Takeover of Greentown’s Management Affect the Company’s Future Strategy?

Jiemian News Reporter | Yang Bingke

Jiemian News Editor | Zhuang Jian

With Greentown China’s (03900.HK) core management team undergoing changes, China Communications Construction Group has continued to strengthen its control over the country’s fifth-largest property developer.

On the afternoon of March 31, Greentown China held its 2025 performance briefing. On the rostrum, Executive President Zhou Changjiang, Chairman Liu Chengyun, Acting Administrative President Geng Zhongqiang, and Vice President Li Jun sat down from left to right in that order.

Among the four people above, the first three are all from China Communications Construction Group, and Greentown’s core management has thus entered a stage of China Communications Construction Group’s full takeover. China Communications Construction Group took a controlling stake in Greentown China in 2015, and has gradually increased its dominance over this well-known property developer.

The day before the performance briefing was held, a personnel change announcement from Greentown China disclosed that Administrative President Guo Jiafeng retired and stepped down; replacing him is Geng Zhongqiang, a “China Communications Construction Group system” executive who has been with Greentown for 6 years, appointed as Acting Administrative President.

Guo Jiafeng joined Greentown in 1999 and is a veteran figure. At the briefing, Liu Chengyun thanked Guo Jiafeng multiple times for optimizing the company’s investment layout during his tenure, stabilizing the fundamental business, and said the company will not change its “do-one-cheng-one” investment strategy.

In 2025, Greentown China achieved total contracted sales of 251.9 billion yuan, ranking second in the industry. Among them, sales from self-invested projects were 153.4 billion yuan, and equity sales were 104.3 billion yuan—both ranking fifth in the industry.

In 2025, Greentown China recorded revenue of 154.966 billion yuan and net profit of 22.86 billion yuan, down 44.9% from 2024; profit attributable to shareholders was 0.71 billion yuan, down 95.6% year on year.

At the performance briefing, Geng Zhongqiang said that the main reasons for the decline in profit include that some of the projects delivered in 2025 were cooperative projects in which Greentown China’s equity share is not high, and that joint ventures and associates generated losses.

Liu Chengyun also added that the real estate market is still in a period of deep adjustment, and the industry’s overall room for profitability has narrowed, leading to the company’s profit decline; on the other hand, the company has proactively increased efforts to reduce and dispose of inventory, and, based on prudent principles, has accrued corresponding losses from impairment of assets. These factors together have led to a phased fluctuation in profits.

As China’s fifth-largest property developer, Greentown added 50 new projects last year, with a saleable area of 3.18 million square meters. The costs borne by Greentown were 51.1 billion yuan, and the expected new value was 135.5 billion yuan, ranking fourth in the industry. The average equity ratio of newly expanded projects is 69%.

Geng Zhongqiang believes that the real estate market is still in the stage of building a base. The overall market scale still faces some downward pressure. Compared with the same period in previous years, in the current land market, the supply side has noticeably slowed in terms of pacing; total supply has decreased, while high-quality land parcels are also relatively fewer. For cities with more inventory and slower inventory clearance, developers will certainly slow down land acquisition; for cities with less inventory and faster clearance, developers’ willingness to acquire land will be stronger.

Greentown’s 2026 land-acquisition scale has been preliminarily set at around 1,000 billion yuan, and the specific figure will be adjusted as appropriate based on market dynamics.

Geng Zhongqiang emphasized that investment should prioritize holding the safety bottom line and “do-one-cheng-one” as the top principles, taking into account both cash flow and profit. The company does not place importance on any single dimension; it conducts deep and thorough city research, attaches importance to evaluating the quality of projects themselves, and while cultivating core cities intensively, actively pursues structural opportunities for high-quality land in non-hot cities.

Li Jun believes that in the second half of the year, the real estate market in core cities is expected to stop falling and stabilize. This assessment is based on the following factors: sales of commercial housing are expected to accelerate toward stabilization, and the declines in both transaction area and transaction value may further narrow; inventory reduction remains the primary task at this stage, and in most cities the inventory-reduction cycle is still at historically high levels; at the beginning of the year, the scale of new starts still showed a certain decline—while reducing volume, the supply structure is also being optimized.

Li Jun revealed that Greentown’s sales target for 2026 is 1,300 billion yuan. This figure is slightly lower than the company’s 2025 sales target of 1,600 billion yuan.