U.S. authorities charged two Chinese nationals in a cryptocurrency scam that laundered at least $73 million from defrauded victims, the Justice Department said on Friday, Reuters reported. U.S. officials arrested Yicheng Zhang in Los Angeles on Thursday, according to an indictment unsealed in U.S. District Court in California's central district later that day. Daren Li, a dual citizen of China and St. Kitts and Nevis, was arrested at the Atlanta airport in April. The U.S.

Shares of Chinese property developers surged on rising expectations that government entities in China are moving to help buy up excess housing in a bid to revive the struggling real-estate sector, the Wall Street Journal reported. The Hang Seng Mainland Properties Index, which tracks Chinese property developers listed in Hong Kong, was up 5.6% in afternoon trading Thursday. Sino-Ocean and CIFI rose 46% and 29%, respectively, while Longfor, China Vanke, Agile and Sunac China were each more than 10% higher.

China’s central bank held key policy rates steady on Wednesday, a move that could preface a hold on benchmark lending rates later this month, the Wall Street Journal reported. The People’s Bank of China injected 125 billion yuan ($17.28 billion) worth of liquidity via the medium-term lending facility, which charges banks an interest rate of 2.5%. The rate was unchanged from last operation. The MLF is a tool the central bank uses to lend to commercial banks and acts as a guide for the benchmark loan prime rate, which is tied to mortgages and other loans.

China strongly opposed the United States' tariff hikes, its commerce ministry said on Tuesday, vowing it will take resolute measures to defend its rights and interests, Reuters reported. "U.S. raising Section 301 tariffs violates President Biden's commitment to 'not seek to suppress and contain China's development' and 'not to seek to decouple and break links with China'," said a statement by the ministry, adding the move will "seriously affect the atmosphere of bilateral cooperation." U.S.

Chinese property developer Country Garden made payments on two onshore bonds within a grace period, avoiding default days after the company had said it might turn to a state guarantor for help, the Wall Street Journal reported. The heavily indebted property developer said Saturday that it made interest payments totaling about 65.95 billion yuan ($9.13 billion) on two onshore bonds that had been due last week. Country Garden said that through the efforts of “all parties, the issuer actively raised funds and revitalized the mortgage assets.” It didn’t elaborate.

Two more Chinese cities have unveiled plans to buy up unsold, unfinished or old housing, coming as Beijing shifts its focus to absorbing excess apartment supply as a way to resolve the country’s ongoing property crisis, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. Nanjing, the capital of Jiangsu Province, on Saturday said it would help renovate or buy housing inventories and turn them into public housing.

China's finance ministry plans to start raising 1 trillion yuan ($138 billion) in long-awaited, long-term special treasury bonds this week to raise funds it will use to stimulate key sectors of its flagging economy. The finance ministry confirmed what four sources had told Reuters earlier on Monday that the 1 trillion yuan ($138.23 billion) of special government bonds would have tenors of 20 to 50 years and issuance will begin on May 17.

China is taking the rare step of sharply increasing fares for riders on four major bullet train lines, in its broadest move to address rising costs and heavy debts since construction of the system began nearly two decades ago, the New York Times reported. The higher prices for train tickets are part of a push to raise prices for public services. Earlier this year, water and natural gas bills started going up in some cities. Public services in China are heavily subsidized by local governments.

A struggling property developer in southern China has become the litmus test for investors trying to answer that question, the Wall Street Journal reported. China Vanke is one of the biggest survivors of the property downturn, which has pushed real-estate companies to default on $140 billion of dollar bonds, according to S&P Global Ratings. It has also left millions of homes unfinished and fueled widespread alarm about a slump in the world’s second-largest economy.

China Construction Bank Corp., the nation’s third-largest commercial lender, was accused in a US lawsuit of enabling a massive fraud in the reinsurance industry that left companies with “monumental losses” and sinking stock prices, Bloomberg News reported. The bank allowed employees to conspire with Israeli insurance startup Vesttoo Ltd. to sell reinsurance policies that weren’t real, according to a complaint filed late Thursday by the Porch Group in Manhattan federal court.