Chairman of China's top private bank arrested for corruption

Beijing. (Efe).- Mao Xiaofeng, the president of the first privately owned bank in China, the Minsheng Bank, has been arrested for alleged corruption in a case linked to a former adviser to former Chinese President Hu Jintao, local media reported today. Appointed at the head of the bank at only 42 years old and considered one of the stars of the sector, Mao was arrested by the Central Commission for the Supervision of Discipline, the anti-corruption arm of the State, several media outlets in the country publish, which however do not detail when or where this arrest occurred. Mao's case is apparently related to that of Ling Jihua, right-hand man of China's president from 2003 to 2013, Hu Jintao, who was also detained in December under orders from the disciplinary commission. According to the prestigious Caixin magazine, the arrest of the young banker responds to his "economic ties" with some of Ling's relatives, including his wife. Supposedly, Mao included Ling's wife on the bank's payroll thanks to a "symbolic position", for which she began to receive monthly payments "without doing anything". This practice has revealed the existence of the so-called "VIP Women's Club" of the Misheng Bank, which apparently had been operating for years and which includes wives of important political positions, as well as women of the entity's leaders, reports the portal of newsSohu.com. As a reward for being behind this "club", Mao won the trust of many bosses in his company but also from the upper echelons of the central government. Mao entered the Minsheng Bank, in Beijing, in 2002 as deputy director of the so-called general office, in charge of attending to all the needs of the entity's senior executives, from family matters to business matters of greater importance to the bank. It was an internal division that, usually, all companies in China have and in which managers usually place the people they trust the most. There, Mao won the trust of the previous president, Dong Wenbiao, who retired last year, supporting with special emphasis the candidacy of his current successor. Mao, whom those closest to him describe as "intelligent, efficient and friendly with the press", was key in the Hong Kong IPO of Misheng Bank, which is also listed on the Shanghai one, and has always stood out for its good crisis management and its relationship with investors. Now, the star of the sector whom some saw as the next president of the central bank of China or another organization, will have to manage another crisis, this time, political, and without the support of the entity that has boosted him, since from the Misheng Bank have already declared that it is a "problem only theirs".