A Chinese national who made his fortune from online gaming has emerged as one of the most significant non-American holders of land in the US.
Chen Tianqiao owns 198,000 acres of Oregon timberland, making him the country's 82nd-largest property owner, according to the Land Report's latest ranking.
Chen, 50, acquired the acreage from Fidelity National Financial Ventures for US$85 million (HK$663 million) in 2015. Oregon tax records last month disclosed the name of the beneficial owner as Shanda Asset Management, the same moniker as Chen's Singapore-based holding group.
His Oregon property makes him one of the biggest individual owners of American land by a non-US citizen. Only the Irving family of Canada - No. 6 on the Land Report's list with over 1.2 million acres of Maine timberland - owns more.
Foreign ownership of US land - particularly land used for farming - has become a sensitive political issue in recent years. About 40 million acres of American agricultural land was owned by non-US interests as of 2021, according to the most recent Department of Agriculture data.
Some lawmakers have pushed for national rules restricting foreign investment in American agricultural property. The Senate voted in July to ban the sale of farmland beyond a certain acreage or value to people or businesses from China, Russia, Iran and North Korea, but the measure wasn't ultimately signed into law. Almost half of all states have some sort of restrictions on foreign ownership.
Chen Tianqiao owns 198,000 acres of Oregon timberland. BLOOMBERG
