Gome's founder surrendered the company to a creditor for HK$377M

Gome, once China's largest appliance retailer, spent the years after 2021 losing its stores, its suppliers and its sales — a collapse documented store by store until, by the end of 2025, what remained was mostly debt. The annual report showed total assets of ¥2.529 billion against liabilities of ¥19.952 billion — a 788.8% asset-liability ratio — cash of just ¥5.35 million, FY2025 revenue of ¥156 million, down almost 60%, and another loss of ¥1.721 billion on top of four years of losses before it.

The last financing instrument was the company itself. Under an agreement dated January 16, 2026, Gome issued 25.1 billion new shares at HK$0.015 each to settle HK$377 million of debt owed to Shanghai Jinboding — a creditor that by June held 29.61% and had become the largest shareholder. Founder Huang Guangyu, who rebuilt the chain into a national champion and once ranked among China's richest, saw his and his wife's holding diluted to 6.74%. The shares trade around a cent of a Hong Kong dollar and the whole company is worth about HK$670 million.

The endgame moved fast after that. On June 15, 2026 Gome failed to pay the ¥100 million principal and interest on its '20 Gome 01' bond; within weeks courts accepted bankruptcy liquidation of the Guangzhou and Xi'an trading subsidiaries, and a Wenzhou affiliate filed its own application. The listed shell now belongs to a debt collector, the operating companies are entering liquidation one by one, and the question left is not turnaround but delisting.