China's property giant Evergrande starts repayment plan as pressure mounts over unpaid loans

Beijing [China], September 20 : Amid the increasing pressure over unpaid loans, China's property giant Evergrande Group's has started a repayment plan for its wealth management products through properties.
However, the debt-ridden property giant's prospects of weathering the current liquidity crisis still remain gloomy, Global Times reported.
According to the Chinese state media report, repayment through properties is one of the three options Evergrande offered on the overdue payment of its wealth management products after hundreds of investors headed to the company's headquarter in Shenzhen to demand the repayment of their investments.
"For investors, apartments are not as liquid as cash, but they still have enough value, so the option may not be the best result, but not the worst either," Shen Meng, director of Beijing-based boutique investment bank Chanson & Co, told the Global Times on Sunday.
China's top developer firm Evergrande is under immense pressure as anxious investors recently protested at its Shenzhen headquarters and demanded repayment of loans and financial products. The Hong Kong-listed developer is sinking under a mountain of liabilities totalling more than USD 300 billion after years of borrowing to fund rapid growth, Channel News Asia reported.
Last week, Evergrande was downgraded by two credit rating agencies. Its shares have also tumbled their 2009 listing price. The development came recently as news reports speculated Evergrande's imminent collapse.
Anxious investors have been protested at the Shenzhen headquarters of cash-strapped developer China Evergrande Group. The investors crowded its lobby to demand repayment of loans and financial products.
Evergrande has said that it's facing "unprecedented difficulties" but denied rumours that it is about to go under. Evergrande on Tuesday conceded that it is under "tremendous pressure".
Last Tuesday, the company's shares fell nearly 9 per cent and are down almost 80 per cent since the start of the year. An estimate by Capital Economics said that that Evergrande has about 1.4 million properties that it has committed to complete - about 1.3 trillion yuan (US$200 billion) in pre-sale liabilities, as of the end of June, according to Channel News Asia.
Beijing's crackdown on overextended property developers has led to a surge in loan losses. And it has also raised fears of contagion across the nation's USD 50 trillion financial sector. In the first half of the year, the developers gained good returns compared to pre-pandemic profit levels.
However, now the tougher rules including curbs on borrowing leverages and land purchasing have drawn the system to a liquidity crisis and missed debt payments.