Property buying

    Chinese nationals became the largest foreign buyers of U.S. homes last year as they poured billions into American real estate, seeking safe offshore assets, an AFP report said on Monday, quoting a new study.

    A huge surge in Chinese buying of both residential and commercial real estate last year took their five-year investment total to more than US$110 billion, according to the study from the Asia Society and Rosen Consulting Group. The sheer size of that total has helped the real estate market recover from the crash that began in 2006 and precipitated* the 2008 economic crisis, the study said.

    Pyramid scheme

    Police have dismantled* a pyramid scheme involving more than 5,800 victims from 28 provinces and millions of yuan, according to the Ministry of Public Security.

    Wantong Qiji, which became Global Unity, was run by World Capital Market Inc. and claimed to sell third-party cloud computing* services, according to a ministry statement. The company promised investors returns of 60 to 80 percent in 100 days.

    University sued

    Parents of a Fudan University student poisoned by his roommate have launched a legal action against the university for lax management of a toxic substance, according to a court in Shanghai.

    Huang Yang, a postgraduate at the university, died of organ failure days after his roommate Lin Senhao put N-nitrosodimethylamine*, stolen from a university lab, in a water dispenser* in his dormitory March 31, 2013.

    Commencement speech

    A student from Central China’s Hunan Province will become the first Chinese student to deliver a commencement* speech at Harvard University on May 26.

    He Jiang, a doctoral student in biology at the university, was chosen by the prestigious university as the only representative of postgraduates at the commencement, the China Youth Daily reported on Wednesday. Director Steven Spielberg will also give a speech at the commencement.

    (SD-Agencies)