Yu Liang has turned and departed, leaving behind not just the path of corporate restructuring for one company, but also the heavy silhouette of an era's transformation.
Yu Liang has completely left China Vanke Co.,Ltd.. On January 8, China Vanke Co.,Ltd. announced that Yu Liang, having reached retirement age, submitted a written resignation report to the board of directors, stepping down from his positions as director and executive vice president. Following this resignation, Yu Liang will no longer hold any position within the company. There was no retention of an honorary title like "Honorary Chairman," no transitional role as an advisor; this veteran who served Vanke for 36 years has completely bid farewell to the enterprise to which he dedicated most of his life. His retirement marks not only the endpoint of one individual's career but also signifies the conclusion of an era for Vanke, and indeed, for China's entire real estate industry. Records show Yu Liang was born in 1965 and has now reached 60 years of age. While many large enterprises set a "principle" retirement age for core executives at "not exceeding 65 years," and founder Wang Shi resigned as board chairman at 66, Yu Liang's choice to leave completely at this time is clearly not solely due to age. "Yu Liang's resignation will not affect the normal operation of the company's board of directors or its daily operations. Vanke will promptly complete the process of electing a new director," the company's announcement stated. As of the announcement date, Yu Liang still held 7,394,945 shares of Vanke stock.
Leading Vanke: The Leap from Hundreds of Billions to Nearly Trillions Rewinding to 1990, Yu Liang, who had graduated from Peking University just two years prior, joined the company then named "Shenzhen Modern Enterprise Co., Ltd." At that time, Vanke had completed its shareholding system reform just three years earlier and was on its way to becoming one of the earliest listed real estate companies following China's reform and opening-up. During Vanke's early years, Yu Liang demonstrated outstanding business acumen and managerial talent. Starting from the grassroots level, he gradually rose to prominence, earning the appreciation of founder Wang Shi. In 2001, the 36-year-old Yu Liang took over the role of general manager from Wang Shi, beginning his leadership of a company with annual sales of only about 3 billion yuan. At that time, China's real estate market was in its initial phase of rapid development, characterized by fierce competition and a volatile policy environment. Yu Liang proposed a "100 billion in ten years" target, which was then viewed by many as a fantasy. However, Yu Liang aggressively pushed for nationwide expansion using a high-turnover strategy known as "5986"—commencing construction within 5 months of land acquisition, launching sales within 9 months, targeting 80% of units at first-time homebuyers, and achieving 60% sales collection in the launch month. By 2010, Vanke's sales broke through 108.1 billion yuan, making it China's first real estate company to reach the 100-billion-yuan sales milestone. In June 2017, during a board reshuffle, Wang Shi formally resigned as chairman of the board. After completing a lengthy 16-year "practical test" as president, Yu Liang was duly elected as the new board chairman, marking the full commencement of the "Yu Liang era" at Vanke. By 2020, Vanke's annual sales had approached 800 billion yuan, establishing it as one of the world's largest property developers. At that time, Vanke was widely regarded as a "triple-A student" within the industry. Under Yu Liang's leadership, Vanke not only expanded in scale but also completed a transformation from a pure residential developer to an "urban and rural constructor and lifestyle service provider." He spearheaded Vanke's diversification into property services, logistics and warehousing, long-term rental apartments, commercial operations, and other sectors. However, an industry inflection point arrived quietly. Since the real estate market entered a period of deep adjustment in 2022, Vanke maintained its expansion momentum, with land acquisition spending reaching a high of 84.1 billion yuan in 2023. This aggressive strategy soon backfired during the downturn: In 2024, a liquidity crisis erupted at Vanke. The company faced 162 billion yuan in interest-bearing debt maturing within the year, while it held only 88.2 billion yuan in cash on its books and generated a mere 3.8 billion yuan in net operating cash flow. It recorded a massive loss of nearly 50 billion yuan, becoming the publicly listed company with the largest loss on the A-share market.
From Passing the Baton to Exiting the Stage Amid the crisis, changes occurred rapidly. On January 27, 2025, while forecasting an annual loss of approximately 45 billion yuan for 2024, Vanke announced a major management reshuffle: major shareholder Shenzhen Metro Group dispatched executives to key departments, effectively taking over the company's operations. Yu Liang resigned as chairman of the board and transitioned to the roles of group director and executive vice president, with his responsibilities narrowed to "strategy and macro research." Stepping down from the top position to a secondary role, this "downward" career path is relatively rare in Chinese corporate circles. Public opinion at the time widely interpreted it as "preserving dignity while relinquishing real power." Subsequently, Huang Liping, with a Shenzhen Metro background, took over as company chairman in October 2025. At an extraordinary general meeting held the following month, Huang Liping pledged that Shenzhen Metro Group, as the major shareholder, would work tirelessly with all parties to help Vanke resolve its risks in an orderly manner. Yu Liang also appeared at that shareholders' meeting, speaking publicly about the industry situation for the last time in the capacity of a "real estate macro researcher." Now, with the release of the retirement announcement, the last formal tie between Yu Liang and Vanke has been severed. He leaves behind a company still struggling in a vortex of debt. On December 30, 2025, a 250 million yuan equity stake in VX Logistics held by Vanke was frozen by the Xuzhou Intermediate People's Court in Jiangsu Province, with a freeze period lasting three years. VX Logistics is one of the few high-quality assets within Vanke's portfolio capable of generating stable cash flow, and it represents one of Vanke's most critical bargaining chips in debt negotiations and efforts to seek new financing or strategic partnerships. The latest market news indicates that, under the coordination of the Shenzhen State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission, major lending banks have agreed to defer interest payments on some of Vanke's loans until September 2026 to avoid default. Among these, the grace period for one tranche involving 1.1 billion yuan in domestic medium-term notes has been extended until January 28, 2026. Yu Liang's departure symbolizes the simultaneous exit of an old real estate era, reliant on high leverage, high turnover, and scale expansion, along with its representative professional manager. His retirement might perhaps turn a new page for Vanke—an era that no longer depends on individual authority but must instead rely on institutional resilience, credit reconstruction, and genuine cash flow for survival. As the market focus shifts from "who will be the next Vanke" to "who will save Vanke," this former industry benchmark is being forced to learn the harshest lessons of survival in uncharted, unescorted deep waters. Yu Liang's departure leaves behind not just the arduous path of restructuring for one company, but also the weighty shadow of an entire era's transformation.
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