It has been a wild and tumultuous year for property developers. Although most have a diversified portfolio of properties, the pandemic has hit the hotel segment hard and the resulting poor sentiment has dented demand for residential properties. City Developments Limited (SGX: C09), or CDL, is no exception. In late January, the property conglomerate issued a profit warning, citing large losses due to the write-down of its Chinese joint venture investment. True to its word, when CDL reported its full-year 2020 earnings, it shocked the stock market with a massive S$1.9 billion loss. A triple whammy The huge loss was caused by a triple whammy of impairments and accounting losses brought about by the crisis. The main culprit was CDL’s one-off impairment of S$1.78 billion on its joint venture investment in China, Sincere Property Group (“Sincere”). This massive impairment accounted for 93% of the group’s total investment in Sincere....