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Meet Evergrande CEO Hui Ka-yan, the billionaire behind the giant Chinese property developer in danger of defaulting on US$300 billion in loans

Hui Ka-yan, or Xu Jiayin, chairman of Evergrande Group, is not having an easy 2021 by most accounts. Photo: Getty

Property giant Evergrande is teetering on the edge of defaulting on US$300 billion worth of loans that it took to build projects it can’t sell off.

With over 1,300 real estate projects and 7.3 billion square feet of contracted land, Evergrande’s possible collapse has experts worried that it could rattle the entire Chinese economy in one fell swoop.
The Evergrande Group HQ in Shenzhen, Guangdong, China. Photo: Reuters

But while the company continues to sag under the weight of its liabilities, its chairman and founder, the billionaire Hui Ka-yan, has been earning billions from Evergrande.

Keep scrolling to find out more about Hui Ka-yan.

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Hui Ka-yan was worth US$27.7 billion in March, though he’s lost a substantial amount of that wealth since

Evergrande Group chairman Xu Jiayin, or Hui Ka-yan, at the opening ceremony of new home court in Guangzhou in April 2020. Photo: AFP

Hui Ka-yan, 63, was worth US$27.7 billion in March, according to a Forbes billionaire list that placed him as the 53rd richest man in the world. But after Evergrande’s stock plunged 80 per cent this year, he lost a significant amount of his wealth.

Accounts vary at the total loss. Forbes estimates he’s now worth US$11.3 billion. Meanwhile, Bloomberg’s billionaire index puts his net worth at US$7.6 billion after losing US$15.8 billion of his fortune this year. Either way, he’s still very rich.

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Hui, whose name is Xu Jiayin in Mandarin, has also been a professor at his alma mater, the Wuhan University of Science and Technology, since 2003.

He’s currently married to Ding Yumei, a woman from a well-off family whom he met while working one of his first jobs at an iron and steel company, according to local media outlet Sports QQ. The couple has two children and live in Shenzhen, China.

He came from a working-class family and grew up in a rural village in the Chinese province of Henan

China Evergrande’s head honchos: Pan Darong, executive director and chief financial officer; Hui Ka-yan, chairman of the board; and Xia Haijun, vice-chairman of the board and president. Photo: Nora Tam

Hui was born on October 9, 1958, in a rural village of 50,000 people in China’s Henan province. His father was a retired soldier who fought in the Second Sino-Japanese War in the 1930s to 1940s and later worked in a warehouse, according to an article posted to the news arm of Sina.

After graduating high school, he worked at a cement factory and his father’s warehouse, before starting his university education at the Wuhan Institute of Iron and Steel in 1978, where he studied metallurgy, the outlet reported.

Hui worked for 10 years at a steel factory in the 1980s, before founding Evergrande

A worker manipulates coils of steel at Xiwang Special Steel in Zouping County in eastern China’s Shandong province. Photo: AP

After graduating from college, Hui was assigned to work at a heat treatment shop in Wuyang Iron and Steel Company, where he met his wife.

He rose quickly through the ranks and was promoted to director of the company in 1985, according to Sports QQ.

After working 10 years there, Hui resigned in 1992 and moved to Shenzhen, where he took up leadership positions in a trading company.

In 1996, he moved to Guangzhou and founded the Evergrande Group, as China began its rapid urbanisation, and its housing market started to grow.

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Hui grew his fortune by US$30 billion, partially off dividends while his company became more indebted

The lucrative listing debut of Evergrande Real Estate Group, led by chairman Hui Ka-yan, at the Hong Kong stock exchange. Photo: Jonathan Wong

As Evergrande’s liabilities started accelerating in 2014, so did Hui’s wealth. He grew his fortune to a peak of US$36.2 billion in 2019, according to Forbes. That same year Evergrande’s debts jumped US$42.8 billion.

Hui, who owns 71 per cent of Evergrande’s shares, has been paid US$8 billion in dividends in the last 10 years, reported Forbes. He received US$5.3 billion of these dividends from 2017 to 2020, when Evergrande’s debt started burgeoning to the US$300 billion it is today.

Even if the value of his shares in Evergrande reaches zero, the fortune he has made from his dividends would still make him one of the 100 richest men in China, noted Forbes reporter Hank Tucker.

Hui diversified Evergrande, diving into soccer, bottled water, and an amusement park

A concept image for one of Evergrande’s amusement parks, Evergrande Fairyland. Photo: wantubizhi.com

Hui’s ambitions didn’t stop at real estate. He acquired a soccer team from Guangzhou in 2010, and hired World Cup-winning managers Marcello Lippi and Luiz Felipe Scolari.

The team, called Guangzhou Evergrande FC, has won the Asian Football Confederation’s (AFC) Champions League twice – in 2013 and 2015 – and has got first place in the Chinese Super League eight times in the last decade. It was also the first Asian club to be listed for an IPO in China in 2015, but has recently been hit with losses and plans to delist itself, reported Bloomberg. Earlier this year, it also attempted to distance itself from Evergrande by removing the company’s name from its name.

Evergrande has also made forays into the bottled water market, and owns a 49 per cent stake in Evergrande Spring, which sells water in 500,000 locations around China, according to its 2020 annual report.

Among its other investments, including stakes in tourism, health care and finance, it’s building an amusement park that Hui said in Evergrande’s report combines “physical amusement and online entertainment”. Called Evergrande Fairyland, it’s meant to cater to kids under 15.

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He wants to beat Tesla on the new-energy car market

A Hengchi 1 electric vehicle is on display at the Evergrande Auto booth during the 19th Shanghai International Automobile Industry Exhibition, aka Auto Shanghai 2021, in April 2021. Photo: Getty Images
Hui might also be looking to challenge Elon Musk’s Tesla as a leader in the energy vehicle market. In 2019, Evergrande spent billions in research and development to create 14 car models, per its annual report.

A year later, it unveiled six electric car models, vowing to become the world’s leading electric vehicle producer within five years.

Dubbed the “Hengchi” line, the cars range from SUVs to sedans. But Evergrande Auto hasn’t actually sold any cars, Bloomberg reported in April.

On Monday, it announced it would put on hold its plans for a listing on the Chinese market, while Evergrande as a whole deals with its debt issues, according to Nikkei.

“It’s a weird company,” Bill Russo, the founder and CEO of Automobility Ltd., told Bloomberg. “They’ve poured a lot of money in that hasn’t really returned anything, plus they’re entering an industry in which they have very limited understanding.”

This article originally appeared on Business Insider.
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  • If real estate behemoth Evergrande collapses, experts warn it could shake the entire Chinese economy – and it’s already knocked billions off its CEO’s bank balance
  • Hui Ka-yan, or Xu Jiayin, tried to challenge Elon Musk’s Tesla in the electric car game, bought winning sports team Guangzhou Evergrande FC and is working on amusement park Evergrande Fairyland