A Chinese banking executive who rose from a position as a leading ship financier has been placed under formal investigation by Beijing’s Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI).
Li Li, president of the Beijing branch and former president of the Shanghai branch of the Export-Import Bank of China (CExim), was placed under investigation last week, according to an announcement by the CCDI and officials of Yunnan province.
The announcement said Li Li was “suspected of serious violations of discipline law”, a formulaic expression that is routinely taken to imply charges of financial corruption.
Li Li was promoted from the ranks of CExim’s transport department to top leadership a decade ago.
But from 2006 to 2012, before the ascendancy of Chinese financial leasing, her position as head of shipping and later of transport at the policy bank’s Beijing headquarters made her one of the most internationally visible faces of Chinese ship finance.
CExim collaborates closely with the leasing houses, and Li Li retained a close connection with shipping after rising to the top management level.
Some ship-finance sources now expect to see a slowdown in new Chinese leasing deals, with ongoing deals likely to be put on hold. Investigations in the sector could also lead to greater transparency and more attention to procedure, further slowing the pace of dealmaking to the advantage of international financiers.
But others told TradeWinds they expect little noticeable change, against the background of the annual Chinese New Year standstill in business activity.
They also expect Chinese financial institutions to continue to fund leasing vehicles in shipping, not least thanks to the struggles of the Chinese property market, following the high-profile default of real-estate developer Evergrande.
However, current and former officials of shipping departments of Chinese leasing companies told TradeWinds that rumours of widespread CCDI interrogations in the sector were untrue. None of the officials were willing to speak on the record on the sensitive subject.
Wang Wei questioned
But the sources told TradeWinds that investigators have questioned at least one current ship finance figure, Smarine Advisors founder Wang Wei, in connection with the Li Li investigation. Wang, who also goes by Eric Wang, was a CExim ship finance department staff member before starting the financial arranger.
CExim and Smarine officials could not immediately be reached for comment on the story, which became known just ahead of this week’s holidays.
One prominent ship financier pointed to the involvement of officials of landlocked Yunnan province in the investigation as an indication that it is not primarily focused on ship finance.
The CCDI is an arm of the Communist Party of China, not of the Chinese state, and its investigations are carried out separately from the Chinese court system and in secrecy. As normal in such cases, Chinese media reports have closely followed the bare-bones CCDI announcement that an investigation is taking place, plus a recital of the suspect’s resume.
Li Li has been a Communist Party member since 2000 and party secretary of the Shanghai branch of CExim from 2012 to 2019 and of the Beijing branch since 2019. Under China’s current President Xi Jinping, the party secretary title takes precedence over business titles.
