Guo Wengui, the eccentric billionaire backer of Steve Bannon and social media web site Gettr, has filed for chapter simply days after he was hit with a large high quality for unpaid money owed.

A court docket in New York gave Guo—a fugitive of the Chinese language authorities and vocal critic of its ruling get together—5 days to pay a $134 million high quality, after being present in contempt of court docket on February 10.

In a Gettr submit on Tuesday, he introduced his private chapter and signed the paperwork on digital camera.

The self-styled Chinese language dissident, also referred to as Miles Kwok or Kwok Ho Wan, stated he "signed the private chapter utility type for the primary time in my life."

"From this second on, I am personally bankrupt because of the persecution of the Chinese language Communist Get together," he stated, with out elaborating.

His troubles stem from $30 million he borrowed from Hong Kong-based Pacific Alliance Asia Alternative Fund in 2008. Having used the mortgage to finance considered one of his companies, the cash was by no means repaid, the hedge fund stated, leading to a 2017 lawsuit to reclaim the sum, which had grown with curiosity to greater than $100 million.

Guo's collectors eyed his $28 million superyacht, the Girl Could, which a court docket ordered to stay within the U.S., however he moved the boat exterior of American jurisdiction in October 2020 with the intention to protect it from debt assortment, in line with New York state court docket Justice Barry Ostrager, who discovered Guo to be in contempt of court docket.

The Chinese language exile was fined $500,000 for day by day the yacht remained exterior of U.S. waters.

Guo, in the meantime, instructed the court docket he would not personal the Girl Could, on which former White Home adviser Bannon was arrested for unrelated fraud prices in 2020.

The 2 males have had a industrial relationship since Bannon stopped working for former President Donald Trump in 2017, with Guo financing media tasks and hiring the China critic as a marketing consultant.

A basis owned by Guo can also be behind the operations of Gettr.

Guo Wengui Files for Bankruptcy
Fugitive Chinese language billionaire Guo Wengui at a press convention in New York on November 20, 2018. Guo filed for private chapter on February 15, 2022, after a New York state court docket fined him $134 million for unpaid money owed. DON EMMERT/AFP by way of Getty Photos

In Guo's chapter submitting, which he additionally shared on-line, he stated he owed cash to between 50 and 99 individuals. He positioned his private value between $50,000 and $100,000—a declare certain to challenged by his many collectors.

Guo owns a multimillion greenback penthouse in New York's Higher East Aspect, however, like his superyacht, he is instructed the court docket it is not actually his.

Guo fled Beijing in 2014 after Chinese language authorities accused him of fraud. Dwelling in America, he quickly grew to become a hard-line CCP critic and an influential political commentator amongst sure conservative Chinese language-American circles.

Nonetheless, human rights activists and others persecuted by the Chinese language authorities have accused him of hijacking their trigger.

In a reside stream on his Gettr account on Sunday, Guo stated he had "little interest in political in anyway [and] I need nothing however to take down the CCP."