Sing Tao News Corporation Limited (Sing Tao) is a Hong Kong media company, incorporated in Bermuda.[1] It was formerly called Global China Group Holdings Limited.[2]
The Group, which is listed on the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong, was founded in 1996, under the name Perfect Treasure Holdings Limited and would go on to acquire and take on the name of the much older Sing Tao newspaper.
Perfect Treasure was acquired by Charles Ho[3] and renamed to Global China Technology Group Limited in mid-2000. The following January, Global China Technology Group acquired a 51.36% majority holding in Sing Tao Holdings from private equity fund Lazard Asia[4][5] and Ho became executive chairman of both Global China Technology Group and Sing Tao Holdings. In 2002, Sing Tao Holdings was fully acquired by GCT.[5]
The company was then renamed again, from Global China Technology Group to Global China Group Holdings Limited, on 4 October 2002.[1] At this time its business interests included the distribution of Nikon cameras and the provision of broadband services, in China, along with the newly acquired Sing Tao media stable.[5]
Ho had been honorary chairman of Sing Tao Holdings since September 1999, when it was acquired by Lazard Asia after struggling under founder-family member Sally Aw.[6]
In mid-2002 the Sing Tao subsidiary, excluding Sing Tao Media Holdings, which held the Sing Tao newspaper, and Colony Hotel, was sold on to Ming Yuan Investment Group, a private company owned by Yao Yuan.[7][5]
Sing Tao Holdings became known as Shanghai Mingyuan Holdings, from October 2002. Sing Tao Media Holdings was an intermediate company for newspaper and magazine business of the former Sing Tao Holdings group. In early 2002, Sing Tao Media acquired the Hong Kong magazines 'Teens' and 'East Touch', as founding titles in the magazine publishing division of the group.[5][8]
The predecessors of Sing Tao Holdings as the parent company of Sing Tao group, was Sing Tao Limited (aka: Sing Tao Newspapers Limited and Sin Poh Amalgamated (H.K.) Limited). As of 2018, Sing Tao Limited still operated as a company and a subsidiary of Sing Tao News Corporation.
In 2003, Colony Hotel, which the company partially owned, was sold[9] to the University of Toronto.
On 22 February 2005, Global China Group Holdings was renamed to Sing Tao News Corporation. In the same year Sing Tao sold the headquarters of its newspaper division in Kowloon Bay, Kowloon.[10] The headquarters was later relocated to A Kung Ngam in Hong Kong Island. In 2017, the headquarters was relocated to Tseung Kwan O.
In February 2021, Ho sold a 28 percent stake in Sing Tao News Corporation to Kwok Hiu-ting (Guo Xiaoting), vice chairwoman of mainland property management firm Kaisa Prosperity, for HK$370 million. Kwok, born 1994, who is the daughter of Kwok Ying-shing (郭英成), chairman of the mainland property firm, Kaisa Group, instantly became the majority shareholder, up from zero. Ho retained just three percent of the company.[11][12][13]
^何柱國購柏寶交易續進行. Sing Tao Daily (in Chinese (Hong Kong)). 19 June 2000. Retrieved 8 July 2018.
^"Announcement & Resumption of Trading"(Microsoft Word) (Press release). Global China Technology Group. 9 January 2001. Retrieved 30 September 2017 – via Hong Kong Stock Exchange.
