China’s top prosecutors promise financial crime crackdown is about to ramp up

A senior prosecutor with the Supreme People’s Procuratorate (SPP) has vowed to ramp up a crackdown on financial crimes in the year ahead, as Beijing pledges strengthened supervision of transactions to prevent and resolve risks.

Zhang Xiaojin, head of the Fourth Procuratorial Office, which is in charge of economic crimes, said efforts will be made to “provide strong rule-of-law guarantees to serve and safeguard high quality financial development”.

In an interview published on Sunday, Zhang said targets would include illegal fundraising, loan fraud, money laundering, proscribed foreign exchange trading, as well as crimes related to the use of virtual currencies to transfer assets abroad.

Prosecutors will also target crimes that damage the order of the capital market and the interests of listed companies, he told the SPP’s affiliated media in the interview that appeared a week before Lunar New Year, which begins on Saturday.

Zhang pledged that the crackdown would “provide strong support for accelerating the construction of a standardised, transparent, open, dynamic and resilient capital market”.

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Crimes in the field of securities and futures “seriously undermine the basis for the operation of the capital market, infringe upon the legitimate rights and interests of investors, and endanger economic and financial security”, he said.

According to Zhang, financial fraud, misappropriation of listed companies’ assets, insider trading and market manipulation will all be on prosecutors’ list of targets.

Last year, the party became the country’s top financial regulator, with the establishment of the Central Finance Commission, as part of Beijing’s emphasis on the need to strengthen supervision of the sector.

President Xi Jinping also stressed the importance of preventing systemic financial risk during a high-level meeting last month at the Central Party School in Beijing, attended by dozens of provincial leaders.

Xi said that “financial regulation must have teeth” and pledged further moves against corruption, noting that “in the process of risk management, corruption must be resolutely punished and moral hazard must be strictly prevented.”

At the central finance work conference in late October – the twice-a-decade policymaking gathering presided over by the president – Xi said that preventing and resolving financial risks must be an “eternal theme” for the Chinese government.

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The country must “comprehensively strengthen financial supervision and bring all financial activities under control in accordance with the law”, he said.

The SPP issued a guideline in December that noted its duties when it comes to tacking and preventing financial crimes.

China is also dealing with an ailing stock market, prompting Premier Li Qiang to convene a cabinet meeting last month to discuss ways of reviving sentiment and entice long-term capital to put a floor under plunging share prices.

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“More vigorous and effective measures should be taken to stabilise the market and confidence,” the cabinet agreed, according to a statement released after the meeting.

Chinese Vice-Premier He Lifeng last week urged a nationwide teleconference of party officials from all regions to support listed firms, calling them a critical “microeconomic bedrock”.

He said confidence, capital market stability and economic development must be promoted, and stressed the importance of high-quality development in the economy.

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