Evergrande founder Xu Jiayin gets life sentence
SingTao · 3 SOURCESabout 3 hours ago2 MIN
Summary
A court in Shenzhen has handed down a first-instance verdict in the case involving Evergrande Group, Evergrande Real Estate Group and founder Xu Jiayin, imposing life imprisonment on Xu and massive corporate fines. The court said the offences involved large-scale financial fraud, illegal fundraising, securities issuance fraud and other crimes committed between 2016 and 2021.
Key Points
- The Shenzhen Intermediate People's Court fined Evergrande Group 8.82 billion yuan and Evergrande Real Estate 7 billion yuan in the first-instance judgment announced on Thursday morning.
- Xu Jiayin, identified by the court as Evergrande's actual controller, was sentenced to life imprisonment, stripped of political rights for life, and had all personal property confiscated.
- The court found Evergrande Group, Evergrande Real Estate and Xu used sustained, large-scale accounting fraud to inflate assets and conceal liabilities from 2016 to 2021.
- Judges said Xu and Evergrande were guilty of illegally absorbing public deposits, fundraising fraud, illegal loan issuance, securities issuance fraud, improper disclosure of key information and unit bribery.
- On the same day, courts in Shenzhen and Nanshan also sentenced 56 related defendants, including Zhen Litao, Ke Peng, Xu Tenghe, Xu Zhijian, Du Liang and Liang Dong, to prison terms ranging from 18 years to one year and 10 months.
Why It Matters
The ruling deepens the legal fallout from one of China's biggest property-sector scandals and keeps attention on how losses will be recovered, with the court saying repayment to victims takes priority over fines and confiscation. For Hong Kong readers, the case remains closely watched because Evergrande's collapse has had cross-border implications for investors, creditors and confidence in mainland property financing.