Evergrande’s Hui sends voice message as rumours swirl
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THE billionaire founder of China’s Evergrande Group addressed company executives in a voice message on Friday (Dec 2) afternoon, said people familiar with the matter, in an apparent attempt to to quell social media rumours about his whereabouts.
Hui Ka Yan, the chairman of the world’s most indebted developer, sent a 50-second voice clip to about 100 executives on WeChat, a Chinese instant messaging app. In the message, he told the executives to resume construction projects, said the sources, who asked to remain anonymous.
He was scheduled to preside over a meeting with Evergrande employees on Friday, but it was postponed. That sparked speculation about his whereabouts.
Evergrande representatives did not immediately respond to a request for comments.
The group sits at the centre of a credit crisis that has rippled through China’s real estate sector and curtailed growth in the world’s second-largest economy.
Scrutiny of the company is heating up, as it marches towards a self-imposed restructuring deadline of end-December. Topics related to Evergrande and Hui were among the top trending items on Weibo, China’s equivalent of Twitter.
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Former Global Times editor-in-chief Hu Xijin said on his social media account that, as far as he knew, the police in Guandong, where Evergrande is based, had not received any negative news about Hui.
Last week, Evergrande said it planned to present a restructuring proposal for its dollar debt as soon as the first week of December. The company also said it expected to receive restructuring support from offshore creditors as early as February. BLOOMBERG
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