The founder of Chinese property giant Evergrande, Hui Ka Yan, has been handed a life sentence after being convicted of financial crimes linked to the collapse of the heavily indebted developer.
Hui, also known as Xu Jiayin, admitted in April to offences including misappropriation of company funds and bribery.
The Shenzhen Intermediate People’s Court also ordered his personal assets to be seized.
His former companies were collectively fined 15.82 billion yuan ($2.35 billion; £1.73 billion) for offences including falsifying financial information and hiding liabilities.
The court said Hui and the companies had caused serious disruption to China’s real estate industry and inflicted substantial economic damage.
Several senior Evergrande executives were also punished.
State media reported that Hui’s sons, Xu Zhijian and Xu Tenghe, received prison sentences ranging from 22 months to 18 years.
Hui, who once ranked among Asia’s wealthiest individuals, built Evergrande from a small property business into one of China’s largest developers.
He founded the company in 1996 after growing up in rural China under the care of his grandmother.
Under his leadership, Evergrande expanded rapidly, relying heavily on borrowing to finance large-scale developments.
At its peak, the company was valued at more than $50 billion on the stock market.
The developer’s fortunes began to deteriorate after Chinese authorities introduced tougher measures in 2020 to curb excessive borrowing within the property sector.
Evergrande subsequently struggled to service its mounting obligations and offered homes at steep discounts in an effort to generate cash.
The company eventually collapsed in 2021, leaving hundreds of developments unfinished.
During court proceedings in April, prosecutors said Evergrande had received millions of dollars in advance payments from prospective homeowners but diverted some of the money towards other projects rather than using it to complete the properties for which it had been collected.
Hui had previously faced sanctions in March 2024, when he was fined $6.5 million and permanently barred from participating in China’s capital markets. The penalties followed findings that Evergrande had inflated its revenue by about $78 billion.
The company’s market value subsequently plunged by 99 per cent. Its shares were eventually delisted from the Hong Kong Stock Exchange in August 2025, ending more than 15 years of trading.
Evergrande’s downfall became a major symbol of China’s prolonged property crisis, with the developer’s failure contributing to wider financial difficulties across the sector.
The real estate industry had been a major pillar of China’s economic expansion, accounting for roughly one-third of gross domestic product at its height.
Property-related income was also an important source of funding for local authorities.
The continuing weakness in the sector has placed considerable pressure on the world’s second-largest economy, while other major Chinese developers have also struggled with debt and liquidity problems.
By: Magdalene Agyeiwaa Sarpong