China’s anti-corruption watchdog has reportedly placed Tian Huiyu, the former president of China Merchants Bank, under investigation, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) wrote.
It comes after he was abruptly removed from the head of the state-backed lender.
Huiyu was “suspected of seriously violating discipline and laws”, according to China’s Central Commission for Discipline Inspection.
Tian had been chairman of China Merchants Bank for eight years, and the board voted to remove him.
Instead, Wang Liang, the CFO, will oversee things instead.
Additionally, the company released its first quarter results, showing a 13% year-over-year profit increase.
China Merchants Bank, whose parent company is China Merchants Group, has been providing retail and corporate banking services nationwide since its establishment in 1987, with more than 2,000 branches.
Tian’s management has seen the bank increase its consumer lending business and sales of wealth management products. The company’s assets more than doubled and reached $1.46 trillion at the end of March.
These events come as Chinese President Xi Jinping has launched a series of inspections at many of the country’s largest public financial institutions, which have targeted various banks, investments and financial regulators, focusing on whether these entities are now too close to private companies.
In January, PYMNTS wrote that more than 60 China IPOs were pending, including one from China’s Deutsche Bank AG securities firm, as regulators investigated the law firms and underwriters behind them.
See more: China investigation triggers delay in over 60 IPOs
The report said 12 planned IPOs in Shanghai’s STAR Market, the country’s tech hub, and another 48 in Shenzhen’s startup cluster, ChiNext, have been put on hold.
All of the companies had hired one or more of the three firms under investigation by securities regulators, Zhong De Securities Co., a joint venture between Deutsche Bank and Shanxi Securities.
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