Late at night on October 5, pioneer group announced that Zhang Zhenxin, chairman of the group and actual controller of Wangxin group, died at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital in London on September 18 due to multiple organ failure, alcohol dependence and acute pancreatitis.
People close to Zhang told the interface news reporter that on the afternoon of September 19, London time, Zhang Zhenxin suddenly fainted at home. After nearly eight hours of rescue, he was declared dead at 22:20 on September 19, London time. He was 48 years old.
The news of Zhang Zhenxin's death had been widely spread in the financial circle, and even spread the argument of "pretending to die" to escape debt.
After 16 years of entrepreneurship, the 'financial tycoon' who was questioned about the transfer of property overseas and made a lot of money died suddenly in a foreign country. What happened?
Once dreamed of building China's' Eurex '
Zhang Zhenxin was born in Tongliao City, Inner Mongolia in March 1971. He graduated from Northeast University of Finance and economics. He once studied in Wudaokou School of finance of Tsinghua University and was the first EMBA student.
On August 29, 2003, he founded Dalian United Credit Guarantee Co., Ltd., the predecessor of pioneer group. From 2010 to 2012, pioneer began to try financial technology and carry out the business of "financial workshop". In addition, there was united gold, which focuses on gold financial business. It entered the aviation financial market in the mode of official opportunity, acquired Beijing Great Wall automobile business leasing company, entered the automotive financial service, and began to take shares in agricultural commercial banks.
From 2014 to the first half of 2018, it was the fastest and most cross-border years of pioneer development. Its business covers the fields of financial technology, asset management, investment and wealth management, covering major provinces in China and the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. It has branches in more than a dozen countries and regions such as Southeast Asia, the United Kingdom and the United States. Its Chinese headquarters is located in Beijing and its overseas headquarters are located in Hong Kong. In recent years, it has experienced three rounds of financing, including the entry of domestic top investment institutions and individuals, including CITIC Capital, CCB international, Sanshan capital, xinzhongli and Niu Gensheng.
Zhang Zhenxin, who became the general manager of Dalian Business Department of Shanghai Wanguo Securities at the age of 23 and has worked in the securities industry for many years, also controls the listed company Zhongxin Holdings (08207, HK, formerly known as China credit technology). China credit technology once acquired Zhangzhong finance, and jointly invested with CCB international in Firefly games, an American game distribution company, obtained a cross-border payment license in the UK financial market and controlled amigo technologies in Vietnam.
In other fields, Yizu group, a travel business group, has achieved a fleet size of more than 15000 vehicles, more than 10000 license plates in licensed cities, and its business covers more than 300 cities in China; The United currency with a unique foreign currency cash exchange license was officially listed and traded on the new third board (securities code: 872088); Zhang Zhenxin's overseas business gradually controlled two other Hong Kong listed companies, Hongda financial holding (01822, HK) and Ping An Securities (00231, HK). At that time, the pioneer system had more than 20000 employees.
Zhang Zhenxin once said that he wanted to build a Chinese 'Eurex'. Founded in 1964, Orix Corporation is the world's leading comprehensive financial services group, which has long led the trend of financial innovation and business model innovation. Its business covers dozens of industries such as finance, mainly including trust banking, securities, insurance, financial leasing, real estate, etc. It can be said that at the peak of pioneer development, he seems to be getting closer and closer to his ideal.
Change and self rescue
However, the change seems to start on July 4, 2019.
In the early morning of the same day, a message of "Wangxin is seeking a benign exit" quietly flowed out. Wangxin is the online loan platform of pioneer group. Under the circumstance that the online loan industry has experienced savage growth and multi pronged strict supervision, Wangxin has always maintained zero overdue and rigid cashing.
However, from this moment on, several products of pioneer appeared overdue payment. Nethat securities / pioneer payment was supervised by the regulatory authorities successively because of major business mistakes, and the news of pioneer's' self rescue 'began to be paid attention by the media.
Zhang Liqun, CEO of pioneer group, told interface news, "we have been short of funds since the second half of 2018. We also found that in the past, the stalls were too large, involved in too many unfamiliar fields and paid a lot of tuition fees."
After the news of 'seeking a benign exit' flowed out, the pioneer's cash flow was completely cut off.
On July 22, Zhang Zhenxin explained the reasons for the crisis in a letter to internal employees: from the perspective of our industry, the decline of the real economy has led to a serious decline in the asset quality at the asset end, the value of collateral has shrunk and the difficulty of disposal has increased; At the same time, we encountered some enterprises and individuals who maliciously evaded and abandoned their debts.
'although we have more than ten years of experience in providing professional financing services and wealth management for small and medium-sized enterprises and have a strong intelligent risk control system, we can not avoid risks 100%; Although we have been using our own funds to maintain liquidity and maintain rigid cashing, we still ushered in an unavoidable overdue moment. "
He also made arrangements for the next step: he established a collection management working group, sent notice letters to borrowing enterprises and asset providers, the team came to collect, recovered the arrears by legal means, sorted out the list of arrears enterprises and individuals and malicious evasion of debts and reported it to relevant departments. Start the restructuring plan, discuss the asset restructuring plan with a number of asset management companies, securities companies, auction companies and property rights exchanges, and establish an asset inventory and liquidation working group.
Zhang Zhenxin acknowledged that the group is facing a huge crisis and promised to take full responsibility, get out of the dilemma in three to five years and rebuild a new pioneer.
Pioneer group has been evaluated as a "full license" enterprise in the industry. Most businesses in the financial industry need to be licensed. The licensed fields involved by pioneer include banking, securities, guarantee, factoring, third-party payment, financial leasing, auction, pawn, currency exchange, public funds, private funds, fund sales, insurance brokerage, Internet small loans, financial exchange, etc.
Insiders told the interface news that in fact, the threshold for obtaining licenses in the early stage is very low, but the pioneer Department of insurance and trust business, the most valuable in the financial industry, has not been involved.
The decline of the real economy, the decline of asset quality, 'deleveraging' and the impact of investment failure have put pioneer at risk. A number of businesses led by pioneer and Zhang Zhenxin have appeared abnormal conditions one after another.
In addition to the payment of about 10 billion due in 2018, several listed companies controlled by pioneer, Zhongxin holdings, Ping An Securities and Greentown China, encountered short selling and closing positions.
In terms of blockchain, Zhang Zhenxin bought a large number of exchanges, mining machines and mines and bought a large amount of bitcoin. During the sharp decline of bitcoin in the second half of 2018, he sold it at a low price in order to stop the loss. These investments have lost tens of billions of yuan in total.
In addition, the daily operating costs and financial costs, the decline in the benefits and asset quality of some enterprises invested in shares, the inability to dispose of the borrower's collateral, the poor management of many institutions, and some high-quality licenses and businesses also made major mistakes (such as wechat securities and pioneer payment), making Zhang Zhenxin's self-help more difficult.
According to interface news, Zhang Zhenxin did not run away from debt. In order to manage overseas business, he had lived in Hong Kong for a long time many years ago. Since the pioneer crisis, Zhang Zhenxin has met with central enterprises, commercial banks, asset management companies, investment banks and funds at home and abroad for help.
According to the interface news, pioneer group has sorted out the asset list of more than 20 billion and various financial licenses, and Zhang Zhenxin has also disposed of overseas assets and personal collections. From July 4 to the National Day holiday, wechat Pratt & Whitney cashed a total of 278 million yuan, wechat cashed a total of 61.7 million yuan, and the two platforms cashed about 340 million yuan.