Billions recovered from high-profile P2P fraud case in China

BEIJING - More than 10 billion yuan ($1.45 billion) in illicit assets has been recovered since police launched an investigation into a high-profile fraud case, according to Beijing public security bureau on Wednesday.

Ezubao, an online peer-to-peer lending platform, had been in operation for 18 months before it was shut down by police in December 2015. Police said almost all the investment projects on the company website were fake.

According to the police, Ding Ning, chairman of Ezubao's parent company Yucheng Global, and other suspects had faked financial lease products on Ezubao to trick over 900,000 investors out of more than 58 billion yuan since July 2014.

The company defaulted on loans worth nearly 37 billion yuan, sparking the official investigation, which revealed another Ponzi scheme that had cheated over 210,000 investors out of 1.2 billion yuan since February 2015.

Beijing police finished their investigation and transferred the case to the procuratorate for review and prosecution in August.

Of the 26 suspects, 11 will stand trial for fraud. Fifteen others have been charged with illegal fundraising.

Police departments in various provinces have seized nearly 300 million yuan in cash, 187,000 grams of gold, as well as real estate, jewelry, stock equities, luxury cars, and helicopters.

Police said they would continue to recover any assets and they would try to return investors' losses.