Junket operator to sell $70m Melbourne tower
A gambling junket operator once suspected of having links to Hong Kong’s triads and who recruited high rollers for Crown casino is selling an unused, fully furnished, brand-new 38-level apartment building in Melbourne.
The tower at 18 Moray Street in Southbank, worth more than $70 million, is sitting empty despite having 115 furnished ready-to-use apartments after it was constructed and fitted out during the pandemic by a development company owned by Cheng Ting Kong.
Cheng, a Hong Kong resident, was the subject of an expose by The Age, Sydney Morning Herald and 60 Minutes which revealed his gambling operation was bringing high rollers to Crown Resorts.
The investigation reported that for a period of time Cheng was named on the national criminal intelligence agency’s list of transnational, serious and organised crime targets that pose the greatest threat to Australia’s interest. However, Cheng has never been charged with an offence.
Asian gaming regulator the Hong Kong Jockey Club circulated a report in 2018 to other sports betting and gaming regulators that noted that Cheng was suspected of having a triad background and his Suncity companies maintained deep links to organised crime.
A few months before Cheng’s name was removed from the Australian Criminal Intelligence Agency’s Priority Organisation Target list in 2017, a company wholly owned by Cheng, Imperium Development, purchased the Southbank site for $8.8 million.
At the time, Cheng had already spent an estimated $75 million buying dozens of racehorses throughout the country and a fully functioning breeding operation, the Eliza Park stud, spread across four properties in Victoria and Queensland.
Cheng still owns the marquee Kerrie property near Victoria’s Macedon Ranges where his thoroughbred operation Sun Stud – the renamed Eliza Park – was based.
The 425-acre spread was bought for $3 million in 2013, title documents show. Another arm of his business empire, Sun Bloodstock, spent more than $4 million on 19 yearlings in 2020, racing reports suggest.
In the past two years, Cheng appears to have scaled back his Australian operations.
Sun Stud’s breeding program was wound back in early 2021 and the Kerrie property leased to Hunter Valley-based thoroughbred operation Widden Stud. Entries on Sun Stud’s normally busy Facebook page haven’t been updated since March last year.
The move to sell the completed Moray Street tower is another sign of that retreat.
High-rise specialist ABD Group finished the tower about a year before the builder went belly up in 2021 with creditors appointing SV Partners’ Michael Carrafa and Peter Gountzos as liquidators.
Fitting out the self-contained units as serviced apartments with washers, driers, kitchen appliances and cutlery reportedly cost about $1.7 million.
Savills selling agent Julian Heatherich said there was “no shortage of interest” from a number of buyers. “It’s unencumbered, well-built and hasn’t been utilised,” he said.
Potential purchasers include accommodation operators – the hotel and serviced apartment sector is picking up as tourists and major events spur a revival – and built-to-rent investment funds.
Alongside many other business interests, Cheng’s complex web of Suncity companies has extensive property development and management interests in several Chinese cities including Shenzhen, Fushun and Guangzhou.