Will Evergrande ever recover?

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Marketplace

News, Business

4.5 • 1.4K Ratings

🗓️ 28 September 2023

⏱️ 7 minutes

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Summary

From the BBC World Service: Shares in crisis-hit Chinese property giant Evergrande have been suspended again in Hong Kong, and it comes after reports its chairman had been placed under police surveillance. Plus, EA Sports’ soccer game FIFA generates billions of dollars, but a fresh commercial approach means this year’s edition has a new name. And later: Why are authorities in Paris keen to subsidize healthcare for the city’s pets?

Transcript

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0:00.0	China's largest property developers shares are put on a timeout, again.
0:06.1	Hello, and thanks for tuning in to the Marketplace Morning Report, live from the BBC World Service,
0:10.7	I'm Leana Burn. More woes for Evergrande, the Chinese real estate giant had its stock trading in
0:16.6	Hong Kong suspended, and the thing is, nobody's really sure why it happened, but it comes after they
0:22.7	said they couldn't move forward with their planned fixer for financial problems. To make things even
0:27.5	more complicated, there's news that the company's chairman is being watched by the police.
0:32.2	The BBC's Nick Marsh is in Singapore on this story. Hi, Nick. Hello. Nick, it's not the first time
0:38.3	Evergrande's shares have been suspended over the last few years. I mean, do we know the reason behind
0:42.8	today? No, Evergrande didn't give any reason. They just simply inform the Hong Kong stock exchange
0:50.2	that there'll be a suspension. What we do know, though, is that yesterday there were reports coming
0:56.0	out of China that their billionaire founder and chairman Huikai Yan was under police surveillance,
1:02.8	and there were also early reports in the week that several former and current executives,
1:07.6	including the former CEO actually, had been detained by police. Now, we've not been able to
1:12.3	independently verify these reports at the BBC, but either way, there's been a suspension of shares,
1:18.3	not the first time, like you say, Leana. There was an 18-month ban before this. That was only lifted
1:23.2	about a month ago. That didn't last long. Whatever way you look at it, Evergrande,
1:28.0	continue to be in a very, very difficult position. Evergrande, it's a giant property developer.
1:33.6	It has a huge impact on Chinese economy. So, when Evergrande's shares are suspended, how
1:39.4	significant is that? It's very significant. I think Evergrande has basically become emblematic of
1:45.5	the wider failure within the Chinese property sector. To put it very, very simply, there are far
1:52.0	too many houses and far too few people who want to buy those houses. So, for a long time,
1:57.6	property developers borrowed lots and lots of money. They were banking on a boom. Customers
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