On April 2, the mainland media reported that Zhang Shaoxin, former party secretary and chairman of Bengbu Agricultural and Commercial Bank, was recently heard in a remote session of the court in Yi’an District, Tongling City, Anhui Province, on suspicion of taking bribes, misappropriation of office and illegal loan issuance.
Zhang Shaoxin served as chairman of Bengbu Agricultural and Commercial Bank since its preparatory opening in 2012, until November 2018, when his position was taken over by Wu Yonggang. on May 12, 2020, Zhang Shaoxin was investigated.
In addition to Zhang Shaoxin, 10 other executives in Anhui’s agricultural and commercial bank system are currently being transferred to the procuratorial authorities, and two other executives are under review and investigation.
Before Zhang Shaoxin’s fall, Chen Peng, former party secretary and chairman of Anhui Rural Credit Cooperative Society, was investigated on April 2, 20202.
The Anhui Rural Credit Union was established in 2004, consisting of 83 rural commercial banks in Anhui province, and is a local financial institution with independent legal person status.
Chen Peng fell 13 executives were investigated
Chen Peng has been working in Anhui Rural Credit Union for 11 years and has been a handful for many years. The fall of Chen Peng opened the curtain of anti-corruption in Anhui agricultural credit system.
On May 28 of the same year, Gu Ping, the former party secretary and chairman of Anhui Huaiyuan Rural Commercial Bank, was investigated; on June 5, Li Lulu, the former vice president of Anhui Huaiyuan Rural Commercial Bank, was investigated; on June 10, Bao Xueqi, the former party secretary and chairman of Anhui Fengtai Rural Commercial Bank, was investigated.
On June 19, Wang Man, a member of the Party Committee of Anhui Rural Credit Cooperative Society, was investigated; on July 6, Xu Jinan, secretary of the Party Committee and chairman of Anqing Rural Commercial Bank Co., Ltd. was investigated; on September 24, Zhao Yong, former secretary of the Party Committee and chairman of Jinzhai Rural Commercial Bank Co.
On November 20, Sun Bin, former member of the party committee and deputy director of Anhui Rural Credit Cooperative Society, was investigated; on November 27, Dai Wei, former secretary of the party committee and chairman of Yingdong Rural Commercial Bank in Fuyang, Anhui Province, was investigated, and Zhang Jianjun, former vice president of Yingdong Rural Commercial Bank, was investigated.
On December 21 of the same year, the case of Chen Peng allegedly taking bribes was heard in court. He was accused of accepting more than 78 million yuan in property directly or jointly with others on several occasions, including accepting more than 60 million yuan in bribes from just one general manager of an insurance company.
Qian Shuo, a case officer of the provincial discipline inspection commission, told Lu Media, “A major feature of these cases is that the amounts involved are particularly huge.” Of the 13 executives investigated, seven were suspected of corruption exceeding 15 million yuan, and all the other executives investigated also amounted to millions of yuan.
Qian Shuo introduced, in these cases, some of the objects under review and investigation collusion, common crime, the business chain into a “corruption chain”, “group corruption” interests are shared, the means of concealment and complex and carefully planned in advance, with high intelligence crime characteristics.
The investigation found that from 2015 to 2017, the then chairman of Fuyang Yingdong Agricultural and Commercial Bank, Wang Man, together with several subordinates, in Yingdong Bank capital increase, three times borrowed corporate qualifications from Yingdong Bank loan of more than 100 million, and then turn around and buy the equity of Yingdong Bank, by line to eat line, empty glove, Wang Man alone is suspected of profiting tens of millions of yuan.
In addition to the agricultural credit system was purged, the Anhui authorities in 2020 to adjust a total of 25 people in the hands of agricultural and commercial banks, an agricultural and commercial bank chairman and a president was removed from office for lack of responsibility.
The financial system is full of shady corruption cases
China’s financial system is as shady and corrupt as the Communist Party’s officialdom, and at least 12 other corrupt officials in the country’s banking system have been investigated and punished in the nearly 90 days since November 2020.
These include Mu Yai, former vice president of Shanghai Pudong Development Bank; Wang Xuefeng, former party secretary and president of the Shanxi branch of the Communist Party of China Development Bank; Feng Zengbing, head of the Communist Party of China Export-Import Bank’s business line risk tour working group; Yang Degao, former vice president of the Hubei branch of the China Development Bank; Zhang Baoxiang, former party secretary and chairman of Jilin Bank; Guan Xihua, former deputy party secretary and president of Long Jiang Bank Co. Ltd. and Guo Jizhuang, former Party Secretary and President of Qinghai Branch.
In recent years, the financial sector has also been investigated for corruption, including officials from the “one bank, three commissions” (the Central Bank, the Banking Regulatory Commission, the Securities Regulatory Commission and the Insurance Regulatory Commission) and the Securities Regulatory Commission system.
Zhang Yujun, an assistant chairman of the Securities Regulatory Commission (SFC), and Yao Gang, a former vice chairman of the SFC, both fell in 2015.
Zhang Yujun reportedly acted as the “captain of the bailout” during the 2015 stock market crash on the mainland, secretly joining forces with the SFC under Yao Gang and CITIC Securities, the main bailout force, to loot the stock market and force the authorities to use hundreds of billions of RMB to rescue the market.
In April 2017, Xiang Junbo, the former chairman of the CPC Insurance Regulatory Commission, fell from power. Sources close to Zhongnanhai said that Xiang Junbo’s fall was related to the case of Xiao Jianhua, the de facto head of the “Tomorrow System”.
A large part of the 2 trillion yuan of funds that Xiao Jianhua could mobilize was insurance funds, and Xiang Junbo had close ties with him. Xiao was seen as the white glove of Zeng Wei, the son of Zeng Qinghong, who had swallowed up Shandong’s largest enterprise Luneng Group, which had assets of 73.8 billion yuan, for more than 3 billion yuan.
Another fallen tiger in the mainland’s financial sector is Lai Xiaomin, former chairman of China Huarong Asset Management Co. On Nov. 7, 2018, Lai was arrested. Caixin disclosed that 270 million yuan in cash was recovered from Lai’s house, while his mother received gifts of up to 300 million yuan.
On January 5, 2021, Lai Xiaomin was sentenced to death, deprivation of political rights for life, and confiscation of all his personal property for bribery, embezzlement, and bigamy. on January 29, Lai was executed.
Recent Comments