Last week the news hit that China had placed the Chairman of troubled property firm Evergrande ‘under police control’.
Of all the lovely places in China to spend this holiday week ‘under police control’ is not one of them.
The Wall Street Journal now reports that China Evergrande’s billionaire chairman and founder Hui Ka Yan is being investigated:
- people with knowledge of Beijing’s decision-making said authorities are investigating whether Hui Ka Yan attempted to transfer assets offshore while the company was struggling to complete unfinished projects
The piece goes on to discuss steps being taken, and not yet taken, to keep the property sector afloat:
- Ultimately, many say, it could require significant government intervention, much as the U.S. was forced to step in during the property-induced financial crisis in 2008.
- “The government should take more decisive steps to clean up the troubled property sector, allowing losses to be allocated among developers, banks and other stakeholders,” said George Magnus, former chief economist of UBS and an associate at Oxford University’s China center.
Evergrande Group