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A seven-star hotel to be built in downtown Hangzhou has triggered heated debate among local citizens who question whether the luxury accommodations would bring substantial benefits to the local economy, a report on the website Sina.com.cn said.

A Guangzhou-based real estate group that invested in the hotel four months ago has scheduled construction to begin by the end of this year and to be completed in 2011. The extravagant hotel, to be located in a thriving business area, is expected to be the equivalent of the globally renowned sailboat-shaped Burj Al Arab Hotel in Dubai.

The real estate group also plans to build office buildings and shopping malls nearby, which would bring the total investment to an estimated 600 million US dollars, the report said.
Read more at ChinaDaily.com

No Comments » Posted by se7en / Hangzhou Economy

By Fang Yan

SHANGHAI, March 31 (Reuters) - Hangzhou Xiaoshan International Airport Co, partly owned by the Airport Authority of Hong Kong, is considering going public to help bankroll an expansion to more than triple its capacity in four years, its chief executive said on Monday.

Hangzhou airport is building a second terminal, part of its 7 billion yuan ($998 million) expansion, which also includes a second runway and the expansion of an existing terminal, Eric Wong said.

“We are studying the possibility of raising funds through listing. The board of directors have formed a team to look at this project specifically,” Wong told Reuters on the sidelines of an industry forum.
Read more at Reuters.com

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The confluence of economic uncertainty brought on by the deepening subprime crisis has posed a real risk of a systemic financial event and a prolonged global economic slowdown. This, coupled with another round of de-leveraging in the structured credit market has led to further pressure and deterioration in real estate prices, predominantly in the US and Europe. Given that the pendulum swung as far as it could in the direction of reckless mortgage lending, it will now swing back towards the quaint notion of buyers being lent only the amount they can reasonably be expected to pay back. Whilst the rout has largely been confined to markets outside Asia, we see considerable softening in real estate markets with high foreign participation and in certain high-end segments. Opportunistic investors are pulling back from Asian property given more scope for acquiring distressed assets in their home markets, and loans remain elusive in Japan and Singapore, one of their favourite markets.
Read more at ArabTimesOnline.com

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