China's former 'King of IPOs' has been found guilty of corruption

China stock market investors

Aly Song/REUTERS

LONDON – Yao Gang, the former vice chairman and second-in-command at China's securities regulator, the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC), has been found guilty of corruption. 

A two-year investigation by China's anti-corruption watchdog, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, found Gang had "violated party discipline," and was guilty of "abusing his power to seek benefits and accepted huge amounts of money."

Gang has been removed from office and expelled from the Communist Party.

He became Deputy Director and Director of the Futures Supervision Department of the CSRC in 1993, and was made Vice Chairman in 2008.

His role included approving applications for initial public offerings (IPO) — in which shares of a company are sold to the public for the first time — which earned him the nickname "King of IPOs" for how quickly he processed applications.

He then moved to overseeing fixed income and futures markets.

But a crash in the Chinese stock market in 2015, which saw it lose $5 trillion in value, prompted an investigation. The crash was found to have been due in part to financial speculation and short sellers, and Gang's former secretary was found guilty of insider trading.

An investigation into Xiang Junbo, previously one of China's top banking regulators, was also begun earlier this year.

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