China’s top insurance regulator is under investigation by the Communist party’s corruption watchdog amid a crackdown on the industry that has targeted some of the country’s biggest tycoons.
Xiang Junbo, chairman of the China Insurance Regulatory Commission, is “suspected of severe disciplinary violations”, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, the party’s anti-corruption organ, said yesterday. The agency gave no further details.
In February the CIRC under Mr Xiang’s leadership banned China’s fourth-richest man, Yao Zhenhua, chairman of financial conglomerate Baoneng Group, from the insurance industry for 10 years. Mr Yao had launched a hostile takeover bid for China Vanke, one of the country’s largest property developers.