China’s state oil behemoth gets a marquee Hong Kong address after buying Li Ka-shing’s building

A company called C.H.M.T Peaceful Development Asia Property yesterday agreed to pay Hong Kong’s tycoon Li Ka-shing a record HK$40.2 billion (US$5.15 billion) for the city’s fifth-tallest tower, in what agents say is the world’s most expensive transaction for a single building.

Just who exactly is the buyer? According to several people familiar with the deal, a consortium that’s 55 per cent owned by a unit of China’s state oil behemoth is behind the purchase, and 45 per cent of it is shared by a quartet of Hong Kong businessmen.

China Energy Reserve & Chemicals Group, a Beijing-based specialist in the storage of oil and natural gas, is the controlling shareholder of the consortium, according to company officials in Beijing and Hong Kong.

The Chinese company is in turn controlled by the engineering branch of China National Petroleum Corp., the parent of PetroChina, according to January 2016 prospectus by China Energy when it sought to raise US$400 million in a bond sale.

China Energy bought The Center to set up a base in Hong Kong, and in “response to the Chinese government’s call to go global,” said Lui Shu-kwan, the vice general manager of its subsidiary in the city, in a phone interview with the South China Morning Post. “We just bought the building, but we haven’t really thought through the details.”