Former premier Zhu Rongji is known for his poker face. Unlike his self-aggrandising peers, Zhu rarely painted the huge calligraphy displays that one finds hanging at the doorways of almost every major mainland institution. He only did four.
It was spring 2001. He was visiting the newly founded Shanghai National Accounting Institute, one of the country's three schools for accountants.
He wrote four words: 'Bu zuo jin zhang (No book-cooking).'
'Uphold your integrity ... Don't bow to any pressure,' Zhu said later at an international accounting conference in Hong Kong, where he spoke about the four characters he had written.
Months before that, auditors were caught cooking the books for A-share companies. The China Securities Regulatory Commission ended up sending its audit teams, headed by then 'foreign' vice-chairman Laura Cha, to every issuer.
So it is hard not to worry about the Hong Kong stock exchange's latest proposal to accept mainland accounting standards and let mainland auditors vet the books of H-share firms - and the deafening silence the proposal has so far received.