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New | Country Garden halts Malaysian housing sales amid capital flight crackdown

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The Country Garden Forest City showroom in Shanghai on Thursday. Photo: Daniel Ren
Summer ZhenandDaniel Renin Shanghai

Chinese developer Country Garden Holdings has closed all sales centres in mainland China for its flagship Malaysian housing project amid Beijing’s intensified crackdown on capital flight.

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On Thursday, the South China Morning Post visited the project’s biggest Shanghai showroom on Tianshan Road, which only opened in October 2016. The gate was locked and the showroom empty.

A notice on the glass door said the showroom was “under renovation” but no renovation activities could be seen inside.

The Forest City project, covering 14 square kilometres of land on four artificial islands in Johor, Malaysia, was one of the best-known overseas properties among mainland Chinese residents due to Country Garden’s widespread promotion, including heavy advertising on state-owned television.

The development had been successful in attracting Chinese buyers by offering affordable prices and access to Malaysia’s visa programme for long-term stays.

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A Country Garden spokesman confirmed with the Post that it had shut all the sales centres in mainland China for renovation, but said the move had nothing to do with China’s capital controls.

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