Quick Take: High-Profile Citic Banker, Once Probed for Insider Trading, Gets New Role in Smaller Unit

Xu Gang, a high-profile Chinese banker who returned to Citic Securities Co. in February 2016 after being involved in government probes into insider trading, has recently joined another Citic unit as non-executive director.

CSC Financial Co., one of Citic Group’s smaller brokerage units, said in a recent company filing with the Hong Kong Stock Exchange that the 47-year-old banker’s appointment had been approved by China’s securities regulator.

CSC didn’t elaborate on the appointment. Citic Securities wasn’t immediately available for comment.

Both CSC and Citic Securities are units of Citic Group, China’s largest state-owned financial conglomerate.

Following the stock-market meltdown in mid-2015, the government said it had detained Xu and several other executives at Citic Securities, among others, son suspicion of illegal trading activities.

Xinhua News Agency reported in August 2015 that Xu admitted to insider trading. It is not known if he was punished. Xu couldn’t be reached for comment.

Xu returned to Citic Securities in February 2016 after the government probe into insider trading. Eleven employees of Citic Securities were investigated on suspicion of insider trading following the 2015 market crash, Caixin earlier reported.

Before the probe, Xu was considered one of the most powerful bankers in China. He oversaw the research and brokerage operations of Citic Securities, and was a managing director and a member of the firm’s executive committee.

Contact reporter Leng Cheng (chengleng@caixin.com)