Forbes

26 | FORBES ASIA JULY 2016

T

ill now, the public per-

sona of Angela Leong

On-kei has been as the

“fourth wife” of Stanley

Ho, the 94-year-old Macau tycoon

who for 40 years monopolized gam-

bling in the former Portuguese en-

clave. That moniker fails to reflect

her quiet transformation into one

of Hong Kong’s leading real estate

magnates.

The 55-year-old Leong has

amassed nearly $3 billion in proper-

ties through a network of agents,

brokers and private bankers, most of

it in the past decade. Together with

her stake in SJM Holdings, the list-

ed part of Ho’s Macau casino opera-

tion, whose share price has fallen,

this recalculation puts Leong’s net-

worth estimate higher than at SJM’s

stock peak in early 2014. (The ailing

Ho’s assets were divvied up among

family years ago.)

“I seldom sell my properties,”

she says, explaining her approach

to assets in two interviews with

FORBES ASIA, in Hong Kong and in

Macau. “It’s not about prices being

high or low—it’s about whether it’d

make a good investment.”

Leong has established herself

as a patient, if somewhat generous,

investor. “I’ve been watching her

slowly building up her portfolio. She

is a very, very savvy investor. In my

opinion she’s a very good investor,”

says Denis Ma, head of Hong Kong

research at Jones Lang LaSalle. “She

bought buildings in the past where

we’d kind of felt like ... a bit pricey.

You wouldn’t say that’s a fantastic

deal at that time of the market. It’s

not cheap. Then, a few years later,

she’s been proven correct.”

4th Wife—on

Her 4th Billion

Angela Leong’s property saga, it turns out, doesn’t begin

or end with her attachment to Stanley Ho.

BY SHU-CHING JEAN CHEN

VIRGILE SIMON BERTRAND FOR FORBES

FORBES ASIA