During the graduation ceremony on July 6, Vice Dean Li Feng delivered a peculiar message to his finance students graduating from Jiao Tong University in Shanghai, China. "Don't be ashamed," said the professor in his red and gold academic gown and cap. Once the royal road to success, finance is now the target of one of the Chinese Communist Party's (CCP) hallmark campaigns to bring sectors into line.

With top bank executives under investigation, salary cuts, calls to abandon extravagant spending and official speeches vehemently denouncing the sector, Beijing is forcing bankers to keep pace with "common prosperity." This slogan, endorsed by President Xi Jinping in a speech in August 2021, has become a leitmotif. At a time when the economic slowdown could fuel social discontent, it is now synonymous with the fight against inequality.

As a result, dozens of officials at major banks, all majority state-owned, as well as from investment banks and brokerage firms, have been arrested as part of investigations led by the all-powerful Central Commission for Discipline Inspection of the Communist Party. On November 26, Liu Liange, a former chairman of the Bank of China – one of the country's four largest banks – was sentenced to death with a suspended sentence, which can be commuted to life imprisonment after two years of good behavior in detention. He is accused of having received the equivalent of €15 million in bribes, in exchange for granting loans amounting to over €400 million.

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