Financial regulators recently urged Evergrande representatives to avoid a near-term default on dollar bonds and focus on repaying individual investors — but without offering financial support, Bloomberg reported Thursday.
Analysts Capital Economics estimate Evergrande has committed to complete some 1.4 million properties — around 1.3 trillion yuan ($200 billion) in pre-sale liabilities, as of the end of June.
Xu Jiayin, the billionaire who founded the company in 1996, called more than 4,000 Evergrande managers to a meeting shortly before midnight on Wednesday, asking them to “devote all their energy to resuming work and production and ensuring that properties are delivered”, the state-owned China Securities Journal reported.
He also said the group must “make every effort to fulfil” payment plans the company had previously announced, the Journal reported.
The privately-owned conglomerate had previously offered to repay some debts in kind, promising creditors including suppliers, contractors and investors parking spaces and commercial units instead of cash.