Evergrande Gave Workers a Choice: Lend Us Cash or Lose Your Bonus
The Chinese property giant owes $300 billion and is on the hook for as many as 1.6 million apartments. It may owe tens of thousands of its employees money, too.
At Evergrande’s headquarters in Shenzhen, China, on Wednesday. Employees who say the company pressured them for cash have joined angry home buyers in demanding their money back.
At Evergrande’s headquarters in Shenzhen, China, on Wednesday. Employees who say the company pressured them for cash have joined angry home buyers in demanding their money back.Credit...Noel
When the troubled Chinese property giant Evergrande was starved for cash earlier this year, it turned to its own employees with a strong-arm pitch: Those who wanted to keep their bonuses would have to give Evergrande a short-term loan.
Some workers tapped their friends and family for money to lend to the company. Others borrowed from the bank. Then, this month, Evergrande suddenly stopped paying back the loans, which had been packaged as high-interest investments.
Now, hundreds of employees have joined panicked home buyers in demanding their money back from Evergrande, gathering outside the company’s offices across China to protest last week.
Once China’s most prolific property developer, Evergrande has become the country’s most indebted company. It owes money to lenders, suppliers and foreign investors. It owes unfinished apartments to home buyers and has racked up more than $300 billion in unpaid bills. Evergrande faces lawsuits from creditors and has seen its shares lose more than 80 percent of their value this year.
www.nytimes.com/2021/09/19/business/...nde-debt-protests.html
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