Founder of collapsed Chinese property giant Evergrande sentenced to life in prison
Hui Ka Yan, the founder of collapsed Chinese property giant Evergrande, has been sentenced to life in prison by a Shenzhen court and had all his personal assets confiscated. He had pleaded guilty in April to charges including embezzlement and corporate bribery, marking a significant moment in the fallout from Evergrande's collapse, which triggered a wider crisis in China's property sector and hit investors and banks hard.
The court also fined Evergrande Group 8.82 billion yuan (£960m; $1.31bn) and ordered its real estate unit to pay a further 7 billion yuan. Hui, also known as Xu Jiayin, built Evergrande from 1996 into China's largest developer, once worth over $50bn, and was briefly Asia's richest person, before Beijing's 2020 debt curbs exposed the firm's over-leveraged expansion. Prosecutors found the company had diverted millions in pre-sale funds meant for construction into new developments, leaving hundreds of projects unfinished; Evergrande's shares lost 99% of their value before being delisted from Hong Kong in August 2025.
- Evergrande founder Hui Ka Yan jailed for life over fraud and bribery
- Company and its property unit fined billions of yuan
- Evergrande's 2021 collapse fuelled China's ongoing property crisis
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Evergrande was once China's biggest property developer, built up by Hui Ka Yan (also known as Xu Jiayin) from a single company in 1996 into a business worth more than $50bn, making him briefly Asia's richest person. The firm grew rapidly by borrowing heavily to fund new construction. That model came under strain in 2020 when Chinese authorities introduced new rules limiting how much developers could borrow, exposing how overstretched Evergrande had become.
Evergrande then defaulted on its debts, leaving hundreds of housing projects unfinished across China and shaking confidence in the country's wider property sector, which is a major part of its economy. Investigations found the company had used money paid upfront by homebuyers for construction to fund new developments instead, leaving many buyers and lenders exposed. The company's shares eventually lost almost all their value and were removed from the Hong Kong stock exchange.
Hui was investigated by Chinese authorities and pleaded guilty in April to offences including embezzlement and corporate bribery. The case matters because it is one of the most significant legal reckonings to come out of China's property crisis, and because Evergrande's collapse has had knock-on effects for millions of homebuyers, investors and banks both in China and internationally.
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The case for
Supporters of the ruling argue that Hui's guilty plea and the scale of the fraud, diverting pre-sale funds meant for construction into new speculative projects while investors, homebuyers and banks bore the losses, justify the severity of the sentence. They see it as a necessary signal that corporate executives cannot hide behind limited liability when they knowingly mislead the public and financial system, and that a life sentence and full asset confiscation properly reflect the scale of harm inflicted on ordinary citizens and the wider economy.
The case against
Others, while not disputing the underlying wrongdoing, raise concerns about proportionality and process, noting that China's courts operate without full judicial independence from the state and that such high-profile prosecutions can serve political as well as legal purposes, including deflecting scrutiny from regulators and banks that enabled the debt-fuelled expansion for years. They argue that concentrating blame on one individual, however culpable, risks obscuring systemic weaknesses in oversight of the property sector that also require accountability.