According to Article 176 of the Criminal Law of People's Republic of China (PRC), the crime of illegally absorbing public deposits refers to the act of illegally absorbing public deposits and disrupting financial order in violation of national financial management regulations or in disguised form. The key to accurately understand the crime of illegally absorbing public deposits is to adhere to the unity of the unspecific subject of the crime and the concrete harm to financial order.

Although China's criminal law stipulates the crime of illegally absorbing public deposits, until the promulgation of 1997 criminal law, the law did not make clear and specific provisions on what illegally absorbing public deposits and absorbing public deposits in disguised form, and the Supreme People's Court and the Supreme People's Procuratorate did not make judicial explanations on this.

Article 4 of the Measures for Banning Illegal Financial Institutions and Illegal Financial Business Activities issued by the State Council 1998 (hereinafter referred to as the Measures) stipulates that "the illegal financial business activities mentioned in these Measures refer to the following activities without the approval of the People's Bank of China:

(1) illegally absorbing public deposits or absorbing public deposits in disguised form;

(2) illegally raising funds from unspecified objects in any name without legal approval;

(three) illegal loans, discounted bills, borrowing funds, trust and investment, financial leasing, financing guarantee and foreign exchange trading;

(4) Other illegal financial business activities identified by the People's Bank of China.

The illegal absorption of public deposits mentioned in the preceding paragraph refers to the activities of absorbing funds from unspecified social objects without the approval of the People's Bank of China, issuing certificates and promising to repay the principal and interest within a certain period of time.

The term "absorbing public deposits in disguised form" as mentioned in these Measures refers to the activities of absorbing funds from unspecified social objects without the approval of the People's Bank of China, but with the same nature as absorbing public deposits. In practice, the controversy mainly lies in whether the Measures can be used as the basis for conviction and sentencing of the crime of illegally absorbing public deposits.

Extended data:

Criteria for filing a case

Whether to file an investigation on illegal or disguised absorption of public deposits depends on whether it is suspected of one of the following three situations:

1. Judging from the amount of illegal absorption or disguised absorption of public deposits, if an individual illegally absorbs or disguised absorption of public deposits, the amount is more than 200,000 yuan, and the unit illegally absorbs or disguised absorption of public deposits, the amount is more than 6,543,800 yuan.

Second, from the perspective of the number of households illegally absorbing or disguising public deposits, individuals illegally absorbing or disguising public deposits are more than 30, and units illegally absorbing or disguising public deposits are more than 150.

Third, in terms of economic losses caused, individuals illegally absorbed or disguised public deposits, resulting in direct economic losses of depositors of more than 654.38 million yuan, and units illegally absorbed or disguised public deposits, resulting in direct economic losses of depositors of more than 500,000 yuan.

According to the Interpretation of the Supreme People's Court on Several Issues Concerning the Specific Application of Law in the Trial of Criminal Cases of Illegal Fund-raising:

Article 1 The act of absorbing funds from the public (including units and individuals) in violation of the national financial management regulations shall be deemed as "illegally absorbing public deposits or absorbing public deposits in disguised form" as stipulated in Article 176 of the Criminal Law, unless otherwise stipulated in the Criminal Law:

(a) without the approval of the relevant departments according to law or in the form of borrowing legal business to absorb funds;

(two) through the media, promotion meetings, leaflets, mobile phone messages and other means to promote to the society;

(3) Commitment to repay the principal and interest or pay the return in the form of currency, material object or equity. In a certain period of time;

(four) to absorb funds from the public, that is, the social unspecified objects.

It is not illegal or disguised to absorb public deposits by absorbing funds from relatives, friends or units to specific objects without publicity to the society.

Article 2 Anyone who commits any of the following acts and meets the conditions stipulated in the first paragraph of Article 1 of this Interpretation shall be convicted and punished for the crime of illegally absorbing public deposits in accordance with the provisions of Article 176 of the Criminal Law:

(a) does not have the real content of real estate sales or does not take real estate sales as the main purpose, and illegally absorbs funds by means of returning to the original sales, after-sales charter, agreed repurchase, and selling real estate shares;

(two) illegally absorbing funds through the transfer of forest rights and management on behalf of others;

(3) illegally absorbing funds by planting (breeding), renting planting (breeding) or joint planting (breeding);

(four) illegally absorbing funds by means of commodity repurchase or consignment. There is no real content of selling goods or providing services or the main purpose is to sell goods or provide services;

(five) illegally absorbing funds by means of false transfer of equity or sale of fictitious bonds, etc., which do not have the true contents of issuing stocks and bonds;

(6) Raising funds without real content, illegally absorbing funds by means of overseas funds or selling fictitious funds;

(seven) without the real content of selling insurance, illegally absorbing funds by means of counterfeiting insurance companies or forging insurance documents;

(8) illegally absorbing funds by investing in stocks;

(9) Illegally absorbing funds by means of entrusted financial management;

(ten) the use of "associations", "social groups" and other non-governmental organizations to illegally absorb funds;

(eleven) other acts of illegally absorbing funds.

Baidu Encyclopedia-Crime of illegally absorbing public deposits