Evergrande's billionaire founder is under police control, report says, as Beijing's crackdown on the property giant intensifies

• China has put Evergrande's billionaire founder under police control, Bloomberg reported.
• Other former execs have also been swept up in Beijing's ongoing probe, according to reports.

Evergrande's billionaire founder has been put under police control by Chinese authorities, Bloomberg reported.

Police took the embattled property developer's chairman, Hui Ka Yan, to a designated location earlier this month and placed him under surveillance, the outlet reported on Wednesday, citing unnamed sources.

Hui hasn't been formally charged with a crime but will be unable to leave the location and was likely forced to hand over his passport and ID card to officials, Bloomberg reported.

The news comes a day after Chinese publication Caixin reported that several ex-Evergrande executives, including a former CEO and CFO, were also facing official investigations.

Evergrande was once China's second-largest property developer, but has struggled to stave off a liquidity crisis since 2021 in a financial collapse that's rattled the country's entire real-estate sector.

It reached a peak market capitalization of nearly 420 billion Hong Kong dollars ($54 billion) back in 2017, but is now worth less than $1 billion.

Evergrande filed for bankruptcy in August but said Monday that an ongoing official investigation would hamper its ability to issue fresh debt, sparking a 42% crash in its share price over the past three trading sessions.

Hui's own wealth has tanked as well, with his personal fortune plummeting from $42 billion in 2017 to just $1.8 billion, per the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.