Founder of Evergrande is sentenced to life in prison in China; sentences of five other executives range from 6 to 18 years

The former president of Evergrande, Xu Jiayin, also known as Hui Ka Yan, in 2012 AFP The billionaire founder of Evergrande, the most indebted real estate developer in the world, was sentenced to life in prison on Thursday (19) by a Chinese court, which ordered the confiscation of all his personal assets. Hui Ka Yan (Cantonese name), also known as Xu Jiayin (Mandarin name), pleaded guilty in April to eight charges, including embezzlement, fundraising fraud and illegally taking deposits from the public. Evergrande, which was once China's main developer, defaulted in 2021 on most of its debts, which total US$300 billion (around R$1.5 trillion); Its struggles are emblematic of a real estate crisis that has long weighed on the world's second-largest economy. Hui's sentence ends his meteoric rise, but is unlikely to bring much relief to Evergrande's national and foreign creditors. In addition to Hui's sentence, the court in the southern city of Shenzhen said in a statement that it imposed fines of 8.82 billion yuan (US$1.31 billion; approximately R$6.7 billion) on Evergrande and 7 billion yuan (around R$5.4 billion) on its main subsidiary, Hengda Real Estate, and sentenced five other high-ranking executives to pay fines and prison sentences ranging from six to 18 years old. Miriam Leitão comments on the Evergrande crisis