Critical poem slows Chinese group Meituan shares

Quoting an old poem critical of the emperor in the online networks caused the course of the Chinese group Meituan to crash. On the Hong Kong stock exchange, it fell by five percent; With the losses from last week and Monday, the course lost a total of twelve percent. Investors fear that the state could punish the company for the poem. Meituan boss Wang Xing shared a classic Chinese poem online last Thursday about the tyranny of the first Chinese emperor - now many investors fear that the leadership in Beijing could see this as current criticism. Wang quickly deleted the entry. It has been misinterpreted. Meituan started out as a food delivery service, but meanwhile also provides other offers such as hotel rooms or bicycles via app. The company is backed by the online giant Tencent. Meituan's share price has risen sharply since going public in 2018. The government in Beijing has been taking a tough course against online companies for a few months and is insisting on anti-monopoly rules. Observers suspect that the government has become too influential in many areas of society. Meituan has been officially investigated since the end of April for alleged market abuse, as has been the case against twelve other Internet companies. In April, the antitrust authorities imposed a record fine of 2.3 billion euros on the online retailer Alibaba for violations of competition law. At the beginning of November, the planned huge IPO of Ant, Alibaba's financial arm, was unexpectedly canceled. Company founder Jack Ma publicly criticized his country's financial regulators at the end of October.