What’s new: Xu Weidong, a former Communist Party committee member and deputy general manager of the private banking division of Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Ltd. (ICBC), was expelled from the party and removed from public office for “serious violation of (party) discipline and law,” the country’s corruption watchdog said Saturday in a statement (link in Chinese).
Xu, 53, worked at state-owned ICBC, China’s largest bank by assets, for more than three decades since 1985 and served as a deputy general manager of its private banking division since 2011. He fell under investigation (link in Chinese) at the beginning of this year.
The probe was triggered by Xu’s failure to properly supervise the private banking division’s wealth management investments that were outsourced to other institutions, with total funds mounting to nearly 800 billion yuan ($119.7 billion), knowledgeable sources told Caixin. He was accused of failing to restrict the power of his subordinate Chen Qi, who burdened the division with huge losses, the sources said.
The background: From 2012 to 2018, Chinese banks’ wealth management assets expanded rapidly to tens of trillions of yuan. Since 2015, many lenders and their private banking divisions sought to invest more of their wealth management funds in cooperation with other financial institutions.
Contact editor Bob Simison (bobsimison@caixin.com).
