What is known about the disappearance of a Chinese billionaire from the technology sector?

Founder of the Chinese investment bank China Renaissance, bao fan, disappeared a few days ago without giving a reason for his whereabouts, as confirmed by his company in mid-February, causing stocks to crash on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. However, a few days later, the company assured that the billionaire was “cooperating in the investigation” conducted by the Chinese authorities. what happened to the banker?

Technology Confluence Architect

bao fan He is a 52-year-old entrepreneur who studied at Fudan University in the late 1980s and emerged on the map of the Asian giant as the country’s tech companies began to grow at a breakneck pace.

In 2005, after working in the 1990s at Credit Suisse and Morgan Stanley during the rise of the Internet, bao fan founded China Renaissance to support technology entrepreneurs in China.

Started as a financial advisory firm, the institution has changed course to focus today on investment banking and investment and wealth management.

From its beginning bao fan and his firm has completed more than a dozen high-profile deals, including the merger of Didi’s shared transportation platforms known as China’s Uber and Kuaidi, or food delivery company Meituan, with criticism of the dianping recovery.

According to various local media reports, China Renaissance also underwrote the debt of Chinese e-commerce giant JD.com’s US$2 billion IPO in 2014 and a US$5.4 billion deal for a Hong Kong short video platform in 2021. .

bao fanas the organization’s chief executive, took appropriate action to ensure that the firm began trading on the Hong Kong stock market from 2018.

missing person report

China Renaissance reported on 16 February that bao fanwent missing for several days, the Hong Kong Stock Exchange said in a statement, in which its shares lost 28.2% of their value after the news broke.

“The company was unable to contact Mr. Bao Fang (…). The Board is not aware of any information indicating that Mr. Bao’s absence is, or may be, related to the group’s business or operations that continue as normal,” the company’s filing said, without disclosing details.

According to sources familiar with the situation and cited by economic news portal Caixin, bao fan He did not come to his office and did not appear in public for several days.

Researcher

Bank this Sunday China “Renaissance” again issued a statement clarifying that Bao Fan, who mysteriously disappeared for more than ten days, “is cooperating in the investigation” conducted by the authorities China.

The company said its operations continue “as usual” and offers to “properly cooperate and assist with any legitimate request from the Chinese authorities.”

This new communiqué seems to confirm the thesis of some media that the situation with bao fan It was similar to what happened in 2015, when at least five executives from various companies similarly disappeared, including the president of the Fosun conglomerate, Guo Guangchang, who was later revealed to have cooperated with authorities during the investigation.

In recent days, the country’s economic press has speculated that this event may be related to an investigation launched by the authorities against Kong Lin, the former president of China Renaissance, in connection with his many years as director of the country’s largest state-owned bank, ICBC. Kong Lin was detained by Chinese authorities in September 2022.

Tried to move a fortune to Singapore

According to the Financial Times, bao fan would try to transfer part of his fortune from China from Hong Kong to Singapore, the territory where he tried to set up a fund at the end of last year to manage his assets.

The article cites four people who are aware of the banker’s plans as sources. In the final months of 2022, he tried to set up a family office in a prosperous Asian city-state to manage his wealth from there.

“As many wealthy Chinese did after the (Beijing) crackdown on technology in China during the lockdown, he tried to diversify his wealth in Singapore,” one of the sources tells the FT, without revealing his identity.

Earlier this week, the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) powerful anti-corruption body, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCID), vowed to intensify its campaign against wrongdoing in the financial sector.

Economic news portal Caixin recalled that this campaign, which has been active for many years, has led to the prosecution of many regulatory officials and senior business executives.

(According to AFP and EFE)

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Fernando Carvallo selects information and shares his vision of national and international news. subscribe to our newsletter Las cosas cos sones to read your daily columns.