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Agricultural Bank of China robbery

2007 bank robbery in Handan, China

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJun 22, 2026
Entity authorityQ4693874 ↗
Source-derived summary

Between 2006 and 2007, vault managers Ren Xiaofeng and Ma Xiangjing robbed and embezzled nearly 51 million yuan (c. US$6.7 million) from a branch of the Agricultural Bank of China (ABC) in Handan, Hebei, China. The embezzlement and robbery is considered to be the single-largest bank robbery in China's history. Both Ren and Ma were found guilty of embezzling and robbing a state-owned corporation and were sentenced to death in August 2007. Both were executed on 1 April 2008.

Crime

The idea for the heist began when one of the managers, Ren Xiaofeng, stole 200,000 yuan (c. US$26,000) in October 2006 with the complicity of two security guards, Zhao Xuenan and Zhang Qiang. Ren then purchased tickets for the Chinese lottery, with the intention of winning a sufficiently large prize that he could return the missing funds before their absence was noted, and still have money left over for himself. Despite the odds, Ren was successful, and he was able to return the 200,000 yuan to the vault.

Emboldened by his initial success, Ren joined forces with another manager, Ma Xiangjing, to perpetrate the same crime on a far larger scale.

Editorial summary

“Agricultural Bank of China robbery” enters the record as 2007 bank robbery in Handan, China. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Agricultural, Bank and China can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA dependable orientation record for establishing vocabulary, names and a first evidence trail. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—2006, 2007, 2008—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Agricultural, Bank and China.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“Agricultural Bank of China robbery” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Agricultural, Bank and China provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 22, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q4693874. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 2006, 2007 and 2008.

Critical limits

Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

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  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Agricultural Bank of China robbery”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Agricultural Bank of China robbery primary sources, Agricultural Bank of China robbery archive and Agricultural research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Agricultural Bank of China robbery” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.