Saturday, April 30, 2016

China's Warren Buffet Arrested

From the South China Morning Post, April 29:
Xu Xiang, a billionaire hedge-fund manager, has been formally arrested on charges of manipulating the securities market and inside trading.

Xu was in the custody of Qingdao police, Xinhua reported on Friday, almost six months after he was dramatically detained on Hangzhou Bay Bridge.

Cheng Boming, the president of CITIC Securities, the brokerage house at the centre of security forces’ probe into the stock market rout, was also formally arrested on criminal charges. So were other CITIC Securities executives, including Liu Jun, the manager in charge of brokerage businesses, and Xu Jun, the division chief of equity investment, Xinhua reported. The police investigation was continuing.

The downfall of Xu, often called China’s Warren Buffett, and the CITIC executives shed light on the corridors of power and money in China’s infamously volatile stock market. The hedge funds under the management of Xu’s company, Zexi Investment, were discovered to have large holdings in several stocks that were chased by the stock market rescue fund, according to data in the listed firms’ quarterly reports....MORE