China Evergrande beats HSBC to top most charitable Hong Kong companies list in 2016

The Chinese property firm gave HK$1.8 billion to good causes last year, while overall philanthropic activity by listed companies increased from the previous year

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Published: 7:30pm, 12 Oct 2017Updated: 11:22pm, 12 Oct 2017

Property firm China Evergrande was the most charitable of Hong Kong’s listed companies in 2016, beating out the previous year’s top donor HSBC, according to a report on Thursday, which also showed an overall rise in philanthropic activity by listed firms.

Evergrande, whose chairman Xu Jiayin was named on Thursday as China’s richest man by the Hurun report, donated HK$1.8 billion (US$230 million) to charitable causes in 2016, according to the Sodata Analytics Foundation Association, a body which tracks donations by all listed main board companies in Hong Kong. HSBC, which had donated the most in 2015, gave HK$1.06 billion last year.

In all, Hong Kong companies listed on the exchange’s main board donated HK$12.8 billion in 2016, an increase of 24 per cent from the previous year.

“The increase in giving took place even though economic activity and the profitability of Hong Kong listed companies slowed last year,” said Michael Yip, one of the founders of Sodata Analytics, at a press conference.

Yip said that the donations were given to a range of different charities, but focused particularly on education and disaster relief activities. Sodata relied on companies’ own disclosures in annual reports to compile the data. State-owned coal miner China Shenhua was the third most generous in 2016, giving HK$884 million.