A report from the Chinese website Leifeng (nice spot, Vice) suggests that several employees at NetEase Games have been arrested under suspicion of money laundering. NetEase Games is a substantial Chinese conglomerate known previously for operating Chinese versions of Blizzard games and now as the developers of Marvel Rivals.
The report suggests the arrests were a result of an internal 'sting operation' by NetEase. The location of the weekly marketing meeting, normally held in Guangzhou, was changed to Hangzhou in advance. When general manager Xiang Liang and others suspected of corruption arrived in Hangzhou, they were detained and investigated.
The amount of money allegedly laundered is estimated to be between 800 million and 1 billion yuan ($111 million to $140 million). Additionally, members of Xiang Liang's team were suspected by NetEase to be purchasing traffic for the studio's games. This could have been to skew performance metrics, but that's only conjecture. According to Leifeng, several employees have already been released, but Xiang Liang has not responded to requests for comment.
This scandal has already resulted in a corresponding 5% drop in the price of NetEase's stock (NTES) since trading opened today.
NetEase has been making a push into international markets...
