28 | FORBES ASIA JULY 2016
proaches that enjoyed by many
listed developers.
Leong elaborates on her philoso-
phy: “Don’t do anything if you have
no idea about what it is. Work on it
even if you don’t like it. When you
buy a flat, if the investment’s value
drops, don’t just think about making
money. Think about what you can
use it for in the future.”
She started her property investing
in her early 20s. Leong saved prodi-
giously, working as a treasury clerk at
Ho’s Lisboa casino and supplemented
her income by teaching ballroom
dancing and children’s ballet. By
1986, when she met Ho, she owned
three flats in Macau and one in Hong
Kong purchased to be her mother’s
residence for HK$800,000 (less than
$100,000), all in traditional walk-up
buildings.
One day Ho came to inaugurate
his company’s dance club. Leong,
trained in traditional Chinese dance
and ballet, caught his eye. Once set-
tled in with him, she often traveled
to Hong Kong to buy real estate,
acting on tips from one particular
property agent. “I did not think
much. I bought property whenever I
had the ability to do so,” she says.
That ability took a big leap in
2005, when she stumbled upon what
would become the jewel in her Hong
Kong collection, the Entertainment
Building, with 26 neo-Gothic floors
of offices layered over a 2-story ro-
tunda in Central.
“I was negotiating to buy another
property but heard that this build-
ing was up for sale,” she recalls. “I
flew in from Macau. I was excited
by the name,” which was drawn
from a former theater at the site.
She plunked down HK$2.7 billion.
Leong says that in the contin-
ued commercial property frenzy in
Hong Kong she’s been approached
by “myriad investors,” and bro-
kers say it’s worth at least HK$6.3
billion. “But I don’t want to sell it,
I don’t care—so long as my rentaltheir combined
stake to her early
this year. At one
point Blackstone
contemplated a
purchase, but the
deal fell through.
“Angela’s moti-
vation for acquir-
ing the remaining
shares of LVMH
was purely senti-
mental,” says Terry
Ng, who heads
L’Avenue as Le-
ong’s top lieuten-
ant on real estate.
A former executive
director at Hong
Kong’s Hang Lung
Properties, Ng
retired to chari-
table work at age
50 only to agree
to return to the
patch following
repeated pleadings
by Leong, a family
friend of nearly 25
years.
In addition
to the namesake
building, L’Avenue
fully owns more
than a dozen
buildings in Hong
Kong serving 300
residential and com-
mercial tenants big and small, as
well as the luxe L’Arc Macau hotel.
Plus there are her minor assets
in Beijing and Shanghai, two golf
courses each in China and Austra-
lia, other hotels in Macau (includ-
ing Regency Park in Taipa and Sao
Tiago) and a Cantonese chain called
Macau Restaurant.
While cagey on valuations, Ng
says: “I truly believe our net asset
value exceeds some of the blue-chip
publicly listed Hong Kong develop-
ers.” Of note, he lets on: L’Avenue’s
cost of funding from banks ap-FORBES ASIA
ASIA’S POWER BUSINESSWOMEN — ANGELA LEONG
By January of last year her port-
folio, mostly scattered across Hong
Kong, Macau and first-tier cities in
China, grew too large to be man-
aged separately. A holding com-
pany was created, called L’Avenue,
its name a tribute to a gleaming
31-story luxury office-retail tower,
L’Avenue Shanghai, known as the
Boot for its distinctive shape. That
2009 development was a 50-50 joint
venture between Stanley Ho and
LVMH Moët Hennessy chairman
Bernard Arnault. Leong got Ho’s
share, and Arnault and LVMH sold
L’Arc Macau hotel, one of three Leong owns in Macau.