In Search of Authenticity

Shui On Group Chairman Vincent Lo reflects on business, China's property market, the future of Hong Kong, dealing with The Donald, and the need for authenticity in tumultuous times.

- Ryan Swift

A visit to Vincent Lo’s office at the Shui On Centre in Wan Chai is to take an artistic step back in time. Traditional Chinese art lines the walls. The centrepiece, located in a specially built alcove near Lo’s main office, is a large and very intricate Chinese junk carved out of solid jade. Lo himself can often be seen in traditional Mandarin collar suits, befitting his love of traditional Chinese culture.

Nonetheless, this lover of China’s artistic tradition (don’t look for Lo among the contemporary art at the upcoming Art Basel) is trying to forge an uncharted future for his company, whose fortunes are tied to the bricks and mortar world of China’s property business. In China, he sees great potential, particularly in Shanghai and Wuhan (tier one and tier one-and-a-half cities, in his estimation). Lo has been bullish on China for years, and never fails to note the potential for vast upside.

But China is a changeable beast, as Lo himself would admit. China’s property market has raised eyebrows in recent years, with rising debt levels and prices matched with a slower economy fuelling fears that a correction – or even a crash – is on the cards. Meanwhile, China’s biggest property players have been muscling their way into Hong Kong’s property market.

Amid this turmoil, Vincent Lo has found his own company, Shui On Land, beset by high debt levels. He has taken on a new strategy to forge a path forward, a path that, in part, banks on the good name he has built for himself since founding Shui On in the 1970s. 

In 2004, Lo was the subject of a profile in The Economist, which dubbed him “the King of Guangxi”. It was a well-earned title. In 1984, Lo famously partnered with the Communist Youth League in China to build a hotel in Shanghai, a bold move at the time. The respect and connections that project earned him would benefit him in the years that followed.