China Merchants Shekou 2025 Sales Revenue of 196 Billion Yuan to Shape Industry Transformation Benchmark

In 2025, China’s real estate industry is entering a critical period of transformation from old to new models amid deep adjustments. The structural features of policies “releasing demand and optimizing supply” intertwine with market trends of “stabilizing core cities and increasing second-hand home share.” The industry is shifting from “scale-first” rapid growth to a new stage of high-quality development that emphasizes both product quality and operational excellence.

On March 16, China Merchants Shekou (001979.SZ) released its 2025 annual performance report. Despite a complex external environment, the company delivered impressive results: total signed sales of 196.009 billion yuan, ranking fourth in the industry; steady growth in asset operation income to 7.63 billion yuan; and a 13% year-over-year increase in third-party property management expansion. While maintaining its core development business, China Merchants Shekou has demonstrated its strategic foresight and transformation efforts as “China’s leading integrated real estate park developer and operator.”

Behind these achievements is the company’s deep insight into industry logic and strategic restructuring. During the reporting period, it continued to optimize its “133341” strategic system, focusing on three key shifts: from development-centric to a balanced approach of development and operation; from heavy asset investment to a combination of heavy and light assets; and from homogeneous competition to differentiated development.

This strategy has profoundly reconstructed the company’s business logic and resource allocation. By 2025, the company eliminated five regional development companies, implemented secondary control, and upgraded management of key projects to improve development quality, ensure precise investment, and enhance profitability. Non-development businesses focused on refining professional companies, promoting transfer and integration of existing projects to strengthen asset operation and expand property management. The headquarters established an Asset Management Department to coordinate the operation of held properties.

This organizational change reflects China Merchants Shekou’s precise judgment of industry future: the current real estate market is no longer a simple “land acquisition - construction - sale” cycle but a comprehensive test of “precise investment, product upgrading, operational value addition, and asset revitalization.”

Focusing on core cities, product strength drives countercyclical growth

In 2025, despite a 13.53% year-over-year decline in revenue to 154.728 billion yuan due to industry-wide project transfer rhythms, its core development business demonstrated strong resilience.

The company achieved total signed sales of 196.009 billion yuan, with a sales area of 7.1612 million square meters, improving its ranking in industry-wide sales and remaining among the top four.

In key urban markets, China Merchants Shekou ranked in the top three for total sales in cities like Shanghai, Shenzhen, and Chengdu, among ten cities. In 30 major cities, it entered the top five in 15, continuing to deepen its presence in core urban areas.

The stability of sales scale stems from strict investment discipline. Under the strategy of “sales-driven investment, careful selection, and prioritization,” in 2025, nearly 90% of the 43 new land parcels were invested in the “core 10 cities,” focusing resources precisely. Investment in first-tier cities accounted for 63%, with acquisitions in Shanghai, Shenzhen, and other high-quality land, laying a solid foundation for future growth.

On the product side, the company pursues excellence in “good housing” quality. As homebuyers increasingly prioritize quality, China Merchants Shekou responded swiftly by developing its own “Good Housing” standard system, covering seven dimensions, 28 scenario modules, and 485 technical details, which has been scaled across more than 20 benchmark projects nationwide.

Main product lines such as “X系,” “Lanyue系,” “Qixu系,” and “Tianqing系” continue to innovate. Projects like Shanghai Kangding 19 and Chengdu China Merchants Xihe exceeded expected absorption rates, with 15 projects recognized in national awards, helping the company rank fourth in the “2025 China Real Estate Enterprise Product Power TOP100.” Product strength has become a core lever for market engagement amid industry downturns.

Additionally, the agency construction business, as an extension of development capacity, also delivered excellent results. In 2025, China Merchants Construction added 80 new agency projects (including consulting), with a contracted area of 11.39 million square meters and over 800 million yuan in new contract revenue. Cumulative agency projects exceeded 620, with a scale surpassing 35 million square meters, covering nine major sectors including convention centers, industrial offices, residential apartments, healthcare, cultural centers, schools, parks, roads, and waterworks. Its new signing scale, comprehensive capabilities, and product quality remain industry-leading, with a lightweight asset operation model showing tangible results.

REITs unlock cycles, reshaping multi-format value

A key highlight in the 2025 report is the breakthrough in asset operation. Leveraging its early advantages in asset finance, China Merchants Shekou has built a virtuous cycle of “development – operation – capitalization – reinvestment,” steadily increasing income from its held properties.

By the end of the reporting period, the total income from properties managed within the company reached 7.63 billion yuan, up 2.2% year-over-year. This growth is driven not by scale expansion but by refined operations and capital management. In 2025, 29 new projects totaling 1.77 million square meters were introduced, focusing on core city assets to prepare for future income growth.

Among these, commercial properties through the “X+Commercial” strategy continue to create urban hotspots. Nanjing Xuanwu Garden City attracted over 50% first-store occupancy, Hangzhou North Garden City opened with 650,000 visitors in three days, and Shenzhen Prince Bay VILLA redefined waterfront commercial standards through high-end branding and dining. These projects are not only revenue sources but also engines for activating regional value and enhancing brand premium.

Public REITs have become an important channel for asset revitalization. In 2025, China Merchants Shekou launched the second phase of Bosera Shekou Industrial Park REIT, planning to expand with assets like the Guangming Science Park B land in Shenzhen and related assets in Qianhai, Nanshan District, further improving the “investment, finance, construction, management, exit” full lifecycle model, promoting healthy asset cycles, and strengthening sustainable operations.

In addition, office buildings, hotels, exhibition centers, and cruise services also developed steadily: office revenue reached 1.22 billion yuan with over 330,000 square meters leased; hotel operations earned 1.11 billion yuan, with the Nanshan Yidun Hotel in Shenzhen reopened as a successful urban renewal project; China Merchants Exhibition held over 7 million square meters of exhibitions, and Hangzhou Convention and Exhibition Center achieved a milestone opening; China Merchants Cruises served 4.198 million passengers, with low-altitude economy projects progressing steadily, becoming new growth points.

Whether industrial parks, apartments, hotels, or exhibitions, China Merchants Shekou demonstrates professional operational capabilities. REITs provide a capital platform for these assets, realizing value and enabling asset reallocation, truly embedding “operation-driven value addition.”

Speeding up property management and expanding external growth

As the company’s property management platform, China Merchants Property Services (招商积余) achieved both quantity and quality growth in 2025, exemplifying its “light and heavy” strategic approach.

By the end of the reporting period, it managed 2,473 projects covering 377 million square meters. Amid industry slowdown in new supply, focusing on core areas and high-quality projects, it signed 4.169 billion yuan in new third-party contracts, a 13% increase, with notable market expansion.

Its growth structure has become healthier. In non-residential sectors, new contracts in aviation, higher education, and specialized facilities management grew by 85%, 25%, and 15%, respectively, with increasing professional barriers. The market-oriented residential sector saw a leap, with new contracts totaling 474 million yuan, up 60%, as brand influence expanded from traditional non-residential advantages into broader residential markets.

In the era of “refined management of existing assets,” China Merchants Property Services has not only expanded scale but also led value-added services through “service extension and scenario innovation,” leveraging digital tools to improve quality and efficiency. It focuses on high-growth, high-stickiness service sectors such as resident services, space resources, real estate brokerage, and home improvement, building a diversified, symbiotic service ecosystem.

Thanks to outstanding performance, it was ranked among the “Top 3 in China’s 2025 Comprehensive Strength of Property Service Enterprises” and entered the “Top 3 in China’s Property Service Capability Top 100” for the first time, opening a clear second growth curve for the company.

Maintaining financial security and optimizing debt structure

In 2025, when industry liquidity was under pressure, financial robustness became the “lifeline” for navigating cycles. China Merchants Shekou demonstrated the strength and resilience of a central enterprise.

During the period, the company optimized cash flow management, achieving a net cash flow from operating activities of 9.693 billion yuan, with a cash balance of 86.127 billion yuan, maintaining strong liquidity.

Meanwhile, its “three red lines” remained in the green zone: as of the end of the period, excluding prepayments, its asset-liability ratio was 64.17%, net debt ratio 72.46%, and cash short-term debt ratio 1.19, indicating a stable and reasonable debt structure.

Its financing advantages are notable. In 2025, the company actively implemented new real estate financing models, fully repaid 12 billion yuan of perpetual bonds, secured 14.1 billion yuan in operational property loans, and optimized debt structure significantly.

With high-quality central enterprise credit, it raised 17.94 billion yuan in public market financing, with coupon rates among the lowest industry-wide; its overall capital cost at year-end dropped to 2.74%, down 25 basis points from the beginning of the year, maintaining industry-leading levels.

In an environment of increasing credit differentiation, this “low-cost, long-term” funding ability provides the strongest confidence for strategic transformation and market opportunities.

Conclusion:

As the industry moves away from growth-driven expansion, corporate value increasingly depends on asset management capability, service value enhancement, and financial security boundaries.

Looking ahead to 2026, despite the industry still being in a bottoming and recovery phase, positive factors are accumulating. With structural rate cuts by the central bank, relaxed local purchase restrictions, and ongoing supply-demand improvements, real estate companies with strong core city presence, excellent product quality, and mature operational systems are expected to lead the way.

China Merchants Shekou has clarified its direction: on the basis of consolidating its core development business, it will continue to strengthen cash flow management and accelerate the transition toward a “developer + operator + service provider” integrated new development model. Moving beyond scale expansion, a more resilient, sustainable, and high-value China Merchants Shekou is emerging.