When short sellers targeted Evergrande recently, they were making a more nuanced bet on the Chinese property developer than it might have looked at first glance.
Evergrande is the second-largest listed mainland developer in Hong Kong, with a current market value of $14bn, and one of the best known. In the past eight years, it has been the subject of a high-profile short attack, brought in Alibaba’s Jack Ma as a partner for its football club and undertaken $3bn in acquisitions in unrelated…