SM Investments Corporation (SMIC) is currently in talks for the acquisition of a number of properties in China, a company official said Monday.

“SM Prime Holdings is doing the negotiations,” said SMIC executive vice president and chief financial officer Jose Sio, at the sidelines of a listing event Monday.

SM Prime Holdings is the country’s biggest mall developer and operator.

Sio added that the properties currently under negotiation are “big enough,” but declined to mention their exact locations.

SM Prime currently operates malls in several locations in China, including Xiamen, Jinjiang, Chengdu and Suzhou. The malls have a total gross floor area of 645,172 square meters.

Another shopping mall is scheduled to open in Chongqing this year, as well as another one in a different location in 2014.

The mall operator had earlier said its four malls in China posted a 34-percent growth in revenues to P620 million or 9 percent of the company’s revenues in the first quarter of the year.

Meanwhile, SM Development Corporation (SMDC), the residential property development arm of SMIC, will be launching four to five new residential projects each year, Sio said.

Also on Monday, SM Investments Corp. listed retail bonds amounting to P25 billion at the Philippine Dealing and Exchange Corporation.

The bonds listed were P10 billion worth of fixed-rate Series A bonds due 2014 and Series B bonds due 2016, plus the recently issued P15 billion worth of fixed-rate Series C bonds due 2019 and Series D bonds due 2022.

Sio said the listing would allow bondholders to freely trade their bonds through accredited brokers between the listing date and the maturity of the bonds. — AL/VS, GMA News