Dead, detained or missing: China's businessmen and officials are disappearing

The one-and-half-day disappearance of Shanghai tycoon Guo Guangchang, chairman of Fosun Group, who is sometimes referred to as China’s Warren Buffet, comes at a particularly disturbing time for the mainland’s richest business figures.

The whereabouts of Guo became a guessing game for more than a day, from noon on Thursday until Friday night when Shanghai Fosun Pharmaceutical announced that Guo was assisting the legal authorities in their investigations. In other words, Guo is not charged with any wrongdoings for now. However, the whereabouts of Guo and when he will be free are still unknown.

Investigations are now going on into other mainland business figures.

Earlier this month, a high-flying Dalian tycoon associated with disgraced princeling Bo Xilai, Xu Ming, was reported dead of a heart attack while in jail, despite being reported as enjoying an "excellent health and mental condition” just two months before his imprisonment.

Xu Xiang, an aggressive private fund manager regarded as China’s George Soros, was arrested last month for alleged inside trading, while six of the top eight executives at CITIC Securities, a brokerage house aiming to become China’s version of Goldman Sachs, are being held for questioning over possible wrongdoing.

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“The root problem lies in China’s problematic ties between business and government,” said Hu Xingdou, an economics professor at the Beijing Institute of Technology. “Business has to collude with power to grow, and when there is a change in who is in power, business bears the brunt.”