Fosun to Co-Develop New York Apartment Project in U.S. Expansion

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Fosun Group will co-develop a luxury residential tower in New York, underscoring the Chinese company’s growing appetite for U.S. property holdings after its One Chase Manhattan Plaza purchase in 2013.

Fosun will develop the 47-story condominium tower on Madison Avenue in midtown Manhattan with New York developer JD Carlisle LLC, China’s largest closely held conglomerate said in an e-mailed statement Thursday. It will be the first high-end overseas project Fosun will develop from the ground up, it said. The investment amount wasn’t disclosed.

The U.S. market is “vibrant” and Fosun has “many deals” under discussion, even after asset prices went up “a lot,” Fosun Chairman Guo Guangchang said in an interview at Bloomberg’s headquarters in New York last week. While real estate prices have surged since Fosun bought One Chase Manhattan from JPMorgan Chase & Co. in 2013 for $750 million, they still have room to increase, Guo said.

Fosun, which owns Club Mediterranee SA, is scouting for property investments overseas as it seeks to boost returns from its insurance operations. Last year it purchased office buildings in Tokyo and Sydney, including Citigroup Center in the Japanese capital and 73 Miller Street in North Sydney.

Investments Worldwide

The New York project follows three Australian investments this month. Fosun will co-develop three residential apartment buildings in Sydney and Brisbane in partnership with Australian EG Funds Management, it said in the statement.

“Fosun Property will further enhance the utilization of insurance capital in future overseas property development, acquisition and asset management,” Alex Gong, executive president of the company’s real estate unit, said in the statement.

Last May, Fosun bought Tokyo-based real estate management company Idera Capital Management Ltd.

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