Moody's downgraded Vanke again, and Vanke said it failed to fully reflect the company's positive measures

The 21st Century Economic Reporter Wu Shuying reports from Shenzhen

On April 26, Moody's, an overseas rating agency, lowered the credit rating of Vanke, the leading real estate enterprise, by two consecutive notches from "Ba1" to "Ba3".

In response to Moody's behavior, Vanke responded to the 21st Century Economic Report that the company firmly opposed the decision made by Moody's and hoped that Moody's could accurately evaluate and reflect the company's situation and maintain market stability.

Vanke stressed that at present, the company's operation remains stable, the contract sales scale continues to maintain its leading position in the industry, financial institutions continue to support the company, and Shenzhen state-owned assets and major shareholders support the company and continue to provide substantive support. The rating agencies made the decision to adjust the company's rating based on their pessimistic outlook on the industry and their concern about the company's uncertainty, which failed to fully and effectively reflect the company's positive measures in terms of operation, financing and liquidity, and would also mislead the market and exacerbate unnecessary panic.

Moody's has always been pessimistic about Chinese real estate enterprises, including state-owned real estate enterprises.

On March 18, Moody's downgraded the family rating of Yuexiu REIT from "Ba1" to "Ba2"; On April 18, Moody's downgraded Yuexiu Property's "Baa3" rating and granted it a "Ba1" rating, looking forward to "negative". Yuexiu Real Estate is a state-owned real estate enterprise with a steady growth in scale in recent years, and Moody's is the only international rating agency to downgrade its rating.

At the same time, China's overseas development, which is considered to be the most stable of Chinese real estate enterprises, cannot avoid being downgraded by Moody's. On April 17, Moody's downgraded the rating of China Overseas Development from "Baa1" to "Baa2". From this point of view, Moody's view seems more radical.

Vanke has been acting continuously recently. At the investor exchange meeting on April 15, the management of Vanke admitted that, from the overall operating situation, Vanke has indeed encountered phased operational difficulties, and liquidity is under short-term pressure. At the same time, Vanke has also formulated a package of plans to stabilize its operations and reduce its liabilities, which can properly resolve these periodic pressures.

The management of Vanke said that Vanke would first rely on "self rescue", self resolve risks based on its own capabilities and resources, re open and review all businesses in hand, sort out by category, and develop targeted plans; The second is to make full use of all kinds of existing financing tools. Now we have actively mobilized all front-line forces to make full use of a series of policy financing tools issued by the central government that are conducive to resolving risks in the industry.

The management of Vanke stressed that the debt scale will decrease by 100 billion yuan this year and next, and the debt risk will be substantially resolved. "All projects of Vanke Group will be delivered on time with high quality."

Recently, it is reported from the market that Vanke plans to transfer 10 of its assets in Shenzhen through asset transaction or equity transaction, involving an amount of more than 8.7 billion yuan. The asset types include hotels, businesses, offices, apartments, etc.

Vanke denied the above news to the 21st Century Economic Reporters, but responded that it has always attached great importance to promoting asset trading. Vanke is actively promoting asset trading, including some assets mentioned in the rumors.

While trying to save itself, Vanke's sales kept pace with the market trend. According to the announcement, in March 2024, Vanke will achieve contract sales area of 1.656 million square meters, contract sales amount of 24.51 billion yuan, an increase of 74.82% month on month.

In the first three months of this year, Vanke has achieved a total contract sales area of 3.911 million square meters, with a contract sales amount of 57.98 billion yuan.