Chinese tech billionaire goes missing

BEIJING (AFP): The Chinese billionaire chairman of investment bank China Renaissance has gone missing, the firm said, as shares in the company plunged in Hong Kong on Friday.

Bao Fan, who is also executive director of the bank, is a major figure in the Chinese tech industry and has played a key role in the emergence of various domestic internet startups.

“The company has been unable to contact Mr Bao,” China Renaissance said in an announcement to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, without offering further details.

Shares in the firm slumped as much as 30 percent following the statement.

According to financial news outlet Caixin the 52-year-old dealmaker had been unreachable for two days as of Thursday evening.

China Renaissance was not immediately available for comment after being contacted by AFP.

Founded in 2005, the group has supervised the IPOs of several domestic internet giants, including leading e-commerce firm JD.com.

Bao also facilitated a blockbuster 2015 merger between major ride-hailing firm Didi and its top competitor at the time, Kuaidi Dache.

The case of China Renaissance is reminiscent of a pattern of investigations into top financiers from the country in recent years.

In 2017, Chinese-Canadian businessman Xiao Jianhua was arrested by mainland authorities and received a 13-year jail sentence under corruption charges last August.

Known to hold close ties to top Chinese Communist Party leaders, the billionaire was reportedly abducted from his Hong Kong hotel room by plainclothes police officers from Beijing.

At the time of his arrest, Xiao was one of the richest men in China, with an estimated fortune of $6 billion.

According to Caixin, China Renaissance president Cong Lin was taken into custody last September as authorities launched a probe into his work at the financial leasing unit of state-owned bank ICBC.