Is Yuexiu going to speed up?

On June 9 this year, Zhang Zhaoxing, born in 1963, retired from his position at Yuexiu Group, the largest state - owned enterprise in Guangzhou, and Chen Qiang, a member of the post - 1970s generation, took over as the chairman.

Ten days after taking office, Chen Qiang traveled north to Beijing to visit Beijing Enterprises Group. Chen Qiang stated that the two major state - owned enterprises from two first - tier cities "have extensive cooperation potential in areas such as financial investment, urban technology, and food consumption. We hope to further integrate advantageous resources and deepen industrial collaboration."

Over a month later, Yuexiu Group held its mid - year economic work conference for 2025. The newly appointed Chen Qiang proposed seven key tasks for the second half of the year, with the first two being striving for performance indicators and accelerating project progress.

Two more months later, on October 9, Yuexiu Group announced the full acquisition of Hong Kong Life Insurance, marking the first major achievement after Chen Qiang took office.

Chen Qiang, Secretary of the Party Committee and Chairman of Yuexiu Group

As early as nine years ago, Yuexiu Group first launched a bid to acquire Hong Kong Life Insurance. However, attempts in 2016 and 2017 both failed.

It was not until December 2024 that Yuexiu Insurance, a wholly - owned subsidiary of Yuexiu Group, signed an acquisition agreement with Asia Insurance, CMB Wing Lung Agency, OCBC Bank (Hong Kong), and Shanghai Commercial Bank. The transaction involved 83.33% of the shares of Hong Kong Life Insurance.

The deal was finally finalized in October this year. According to the agreement, Yuexiu Group simultaneously injected HK$1 billion into Hong Kong Life Insurance to expand new businesses and channels in areas such as elderly care and health insurance.

In other words, after the transaction, Yuexiu Group not only obtained a life insurance license, becoming the first local state - owned enterprise in Guangzhou with a full range of "banking, securities, insurance, and investment" licenses capable of providing cross - border financial services. It can also use this as a springboard to accelerate the development of finance and new businesses.

This HK$1.768 billion acquisition, the largest life insurance acquisition in Hong Kong since 2024, may mark the beginning of Yuexiu Group's acceleration.

With the overall acceleration of the group, the real estate business is likely to speed up as well.

According to Lin Deliang, the brand manager of Yuexiu Property, Yuexiu is laying out its "third growth curve." The first curve is real estate development, the second is the operation of properties and commercial facilities, and the third curve currently includes several businesses:

The first direction is to package real - estate industry chain services such as design, decoration, and supervision into a new platform called Yuejianke. This new platform is an extended version of the project - management business. In addition to building buildings, it also acts as an "agent" for local government infrastructure projects.

"We are currently handling a lot of government project - management work. It's not just about these housing projects; now we are even entrusted with building bridges and tunnels," Lin Deliang said. "The government may not have sufficient funds for project - management. The enterprise platform has to invest money and resources first, complete the construction, and then hand it over to the government. The government will then reimburse us through the fiscal budget or give us land if there is no money."

Simply put, Yuejianke uses its business operations to revitalize production resources such as land. While fulfilling construction tasks, it earns profits through the industry chain.

The second direction is urban renewal. Yuexiu Property has successfully implemented this model in Guangzhou, achieving an 8% profit margin.

The third direction is elderly care services, which have reached a scale of over 8,000 beds. Supported by Yuexiu's financial sector, this business can utilize insurance funds to support the development of elderly care projects in the future. At the same time, it can provide elderly care services to customers through insurance products, forming a closed - loop of "insurance payment + physical operation" (similar to the model of Taikang Life Insurance).

These are Yuexiu Property's responses to the situation where "the profit margins in real - estate development are shrinking, commercial operations are becoming more difficult, and the vacancy rate of office buildings is high," as Lin Deliang put it.

Over the years, Yuexiu Group has been quietly improving efficiency and speed. Even its financial system has started using AI technology, transforming towards digitalization. This not only saves financial costs but also empowers business operations through financial analysis, budget management, and risk assessment.

It has to be said that as one of the representatives of southern state - owned enterprises, Yuexiu Property has made much more progress than some northern enterprises starting with "S."

According to public information, Yuexiu Group is a state - owned enterprise with trillions of assets. As of the end of 2024, its total assets reached 1.1385 trillion yuan. It ranks 208th among the "Top 500 Chinese Enterprises" and 11th among the "Top 100 Chinese Multinational Companies."

However, while accelerating the development of new businesses, real - estate development remains the core business of Yuexiu Property. At this year's strategic meeting, the management first set a goal: the investment target of spending 10 billion yuan on land acquisition in the next two months remains unchanged.

According to statistics from the China Index Academy, from January to September 2025, Yuexiu Property's equity - based land acquisition expenditure was 11.9 billion yuan, ranking 11th in the industry, two places lower than its sales ranking. The corresponding equity - based new - added inventory value was 22.3 billion yuan, and the full - caliber new - added inventory value was 52.1 billion yuan. A significant proportion of the projects are "small - scale operations." In this regard, Yuexiu Property's investment strategy remains very cautious.