Citic Once Courting Rockefeller to Go Global in Hong Kong

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In 1979, as paramount leader Deng Xiaoping reopened China’s depleted economy, he invited some old industrialists who had survived the revolution for a lamb hot pot lunch in a cigarette smoke-shrouded room.

Their brainstorming session gave rise to Citic Group, the pillar of a revitalization plan to lure foreign investment and blaze communist China’s capitalist path. Citic grew into China’s biggest diversified company with total assets of $669 billion by the end of 2013 and interests in everything from real estate to banking to golf.