Legal analysis
Usury refers to private loans that require extremely high interest rates. It is generally believed that as long as the loan interest rate exceeds or disguised as four times the bank's loan interest rate for the same period, it constitutes usury. Usury itself is not a crime, but it is not protected by law. The interest rate of private individual lending shall be determined by both borrowers and lenders through consultation, but the interest rate determined through consultation shall not exceed four times the lending rate of financial institutions of the same grade at the same period announced by the People's Bank of China, excluding fluctuation. Those who exceed the above standards should be defined as high-interest lending. In usury activities, the crime of illegally absorbing public deposits is constituted when high-interest lending reaches a certain amount; For the purpose of lending, taking credit funds from financial institutions and lending them to others at a high interest rate, the illegal amount is large, which constitutes the crime of lending at a high interest rate; For the purpose of illegal possession, illegal fund-raising by fraudulent means, with a large amount, constitutes the crime of fund-raising fraud; Usury can easily lead to criminal offences such as illegal detention, kidnapping, injury and fraud; Private intermediaries and individuals with legitimate income from their own funds lend at high interest rates, which belongs to private lending behavior. If there is a loan dispute, it belongs to the category of civil adjustment.
legal ground
Article 680 of the Civil Code of People's Republic of China (PRC) prohibits high-interest lending, and the interest rate of borrowing shall not violate the relevant provisions of the state. If there is no agreement on the payment of interest in the loan contract, it shall be deemed that there is no interest. If the loan contract does not specify the method of interest payment, and the parties cannot reach a supplementary agreement, the interest shall be determined according to the local or the parties' trading methods, trading habits, market interest rates and other factors; Loans between natural persons are regarded as having no interest.
"Provisions of the Supreme People's Court on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Laws in the Trial of Private Lending Cases" Article 26 If the interest rate agreed by both borrowers and lenders does not exceed 24% per annum, and the lender requests the borrower to pay interest at the agreed interest rate, the people's court shall support it. The interest rate agreed between the borrower and the borrower exceeds the annual interest rate of 36%, and the interest agreement in excess is invalid. The people's court shall support the borrower's request to the lender to return the interest paid in excess of 36% of the annual interest rate.