Residential property developer China Vanke Co. said yesterday its net profit for 2005 jumped to 1.35 billion yuan (US$166.67 million) despite the government's efforts to rein in the country's redhot real estate sector.

 

The figure is based on Chinese accounting standards and is up 54 percent from 878.01 million yuan a year earlier. Under international accounting standards, Vanke's 2005 net profit was 1.36 billion yuan, compared with 874.36 million yuan in 2004.

 

Turnover totaled 10.56 billion yuan, up 37.7 percent from a year earlier. Earnings per share was 0.363 yuan against 0.386 yuan in 2004, said Vanke, which has yuan-denominated A shares and Hong Kong dollar-denominated B shares listed on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange.

 

The Shenzhen-based developer saw a nearly 3 percent drop in its earnings in the October to December period, mainly because measures introduced by the government to cool the runaway property sector hit home sales.

 

Vanke said in its annual financial report that daily turnover in Shanghai, Hangzhou, Beijing and other cities dropped more than 20 percent in May compared with the previous month after the government began taking measures including a property gain tax and loan tightening to prevent over-investment in the construction sector in late April 2005.

 

Vanke said it expected to post a more than 50 percent jump in earnings in the first quarter of this year and planned to raise more money this year to help develop more projects.

 

The South China Morning Post quoted company chairman Wang Shi as saying yesterday that Vanke aims to speed up its land acquisitions this year to help meet a 30 percent profit growth target ahead of plans for a Hong Kong listing.

 

Wang told the Hong Kong-based English newspaper that Vanke's acquisition target this year is 10 million square meters of land for an estimated 12 billion yuan, up from the 6.5 million square meters it bought for 8 billion yuan last year.

 

Vanke, which has been focusing on development in Shenzhen and Shanghai, plans to invest more in Beijing, Tianjin and Guangzhou, its managing director Yu Liang said last July.

 

Vanke said it will allow a trust firm to purchase its A shares and, after a lock-up period of two years, will offer them to managers. The stock incentive plan will be funded by no more than 10 percent of Vanke's 2005 net profit.

 

The stock incentive program was introduced by regulators as one of many ways to better motivate listed firms' management and help facilitate the State-share reform.

 

(Shenzhen Daily March 22, 2006)