When China suffered the biggest bankruptcy of its modern era, foreign creditors who stood to lose $4bn went to Wang Qishan, a Communist party official, to request a government bailout. Instead, they got a lesson in laisser-faire economics.
“The fundamental principle of a market economy is that the winners win and the losers lose,” he told them.
Mr Wang’s hardline stance in 1999 after the collapse of Guangdong International Trust and Investment Corporation earned him a reputation as the rarest of Chinese officials: a straight talker with a good feel for media, a strong grasp of finance and a willingness to tackle thorny problems.
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