Jimmy Lai, the billionaire media tycoon and prominent pro-democracy activist, has been sentenced to 20 years in prison in Hong Kong in the most high-profile national security case since Beijing imposed sweeping security laws on the territory.
The 78-year-old British citizen was convicted in December on charges of sedition and conspiracy to collude with foreign forces, offences that carry the possibility of life imprisonment.
He pleaded not guilty to all charges.
The sentencing marks the culmination of a years-long legal and political saga that critics say reflects Hong Kong’s transformation from a largely free city into one where dissent is tightly controlled by authorities aligned with the Chinese Communist Party.
Jimmy Lai’s journey: from refugee to tycoon
Lai’s story began far from courtrooms and headlines.
Fleeing Mao’s China for Hong Kong at age 12, he began his career as a child laborer in garment factories.
From those humble beginnings, he built a sprawling business empire—first with the retail giant Giordano and later with a media conglomerate that would earn him the title: the ‘Rupert Murdoch of Asia.’
At the age of 12, he slipped into the hold of a fishing boat and fled Mao’s China for Hong Kong, a place he had imagined as “heaven” after a traveller from the British colony had once given him a chocolate bar.
“The moment you feel freedom, it’s a high I never had again,” he said of his first moments in the city.
He found work in a garment factory, rising from the factory floor to management.
As Hong Kong’s economy surged, he built his own business empire, founding the Giordano casual clothing chain in 1981 and becoming one of the city’s most successful entrepreneurs.
“The trajectory of his life reflects the history of Hong Kong itself,” said Kevin Yam, an Australian-Hong Kong lawyer, in a Guardian report last year.
From a child labourer in a glove factory, Lai transformed himself into a clothing magnate.
His rise mirrored Hong Kong’s ascent as a global commercial hub, a place where ambition and opportunity often intersected.
But Lai’s ambitions extended beyond business.
The turning point with Beijing and the entry into media
In August 1994, Lai wrote a column in his Chinese-language magazine Next attacking China’s then premier Li Peng, calling him a “wang bak dan”, a phrase roughly equivalent to “bastard”.
Beijing’s reaction was swift and severe. Giordano stores in mainland China were closed, and advertising was banned.
Facing mounting pressure, Lai sold his controlling stake in Giordano and pivoted decisively into publishing, reportedly making about $280 million from the sale.
He entered a media market hungry for gossip but anxious about Hong Kong’s impending handover from British to Chinese rule.
In the 1990s, his company Next Digital grew into the largest listed media company in Hong Kong.
In 1995, he launched Apple Daily, a newspaper that reshaped Hong Kong’s media landscape with tabloid flair, celebrity gossip and fearless political investigations.
One academic described it as “a strange hybrid of frivolity and seriousness”.
The paper soon became agenda-setting and controversial. It thrived until it was forced to shut down in 2021, after Beijing’s crackdown on dissent intensified.
Judges concluded that Lai used Apple Daily to call for international sanctions against China and Hong Kong.
The United States alone sanctioned more than a dozen Hong Kong and Chinese officials.
At the time of his first arrest in 2020, Lai was worth an estimated $1.2 billion, according to a biography by longtime associate Mark Clifford.
The crackdown on dissent
His sentencing has drawn fierce criticism from press freedom advocates.
“The rule of law has been completely shattered in Hong Kong,” said Jodie Ginsberg, chief executive of the Committee to Protect Journalists.
“Today’s egregious decision is the final nail in the coffin for freedom of the press in Hong Kong. The international community must step up its pressure to free Jimmy Lai if we want press freedom to be respected anywhere in the world.”
Hong Kong’s leader John Lee condemned Lai in stark terms.
“Lai used Apple Daily to poison the minds of citizens, incite hatred, distort facts, deliberately create social division, glorify violence, and openly beg external forces to sanction China and the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region,” he said.
A case that spills into geopolitics
Lai’s fate is no longer just a legal matter. It has become a geopolitical issue.
As a British passport holder and practising Catholic, he has supporters in both the UK and the US.
In Washington, members of the Christian right and bipartisan lawmakers have pressed for his release. Donald Trump has repeatedly vowed to secure Lai’s freedom.
Last year, he said he had made a “request” to Chinese leader Xi Jinping to consider releasing him.
US lawmakers have framed the verdict as a test of Beijing’s commitment to its promises on Hong Kong.
“The sentencing of Jimmy Lai is the latest stain on the human rights record of the Chinese Communist Party and the farce of its promise to uphold one country, two systems,” said John Moolenaar, chairman of the House Select Committee on China.
He went further, linking Lai’s fate to US-China relations. “If General Secretary Xi wants to improve his relationship with the United States, freeing Jimmy Lai is where he needs to start,” he said.
The UK government has also raised the issue at the highest levels.
Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper said the British prime minister had discussed Lai’s case directly with Xi Jinping.
“We stand with the people of Hong Kong, and will always honour the historical commitments made under the legally binding Sino-British Joint Declaration. China must do the same,” she said.
Beijing has rejected foreign criticism. Lin Jian, a spokesman for China’s foreign ministry, said Lai’s case was an internal matter.
“We urge relevant countries to respect China’s sovereignty and abide by the rule of law in Hong Kong,” he said, adding that they must not make irresponsible remarks about Hong Kong’s legal proceedings.
Lai’s sentence is now poised to become another friction point between China and the West, alongside disputes over trade, technology and Taiwan.
Denny Roy, Senior Fellow at the East-West Center, which promotes better relations and understanding among the people and nations of the US, Asia and the Pacific, said in an International Bar Association report in January,
“First, the conviction of Lai for collusion with hostile foreign forces underscores the Xi-era CCP’s paranoia over the subversive power of Western liberal ideas. Under these circumstances, China can do business with the West but cannot be friends with the West,’ he said.
Roy’s statement is particularly pertinent as Western powers, including the UK and Canada, seek to recalibrate their relationships with China to secure greater economic opportunities.
“The verdict in Jimmy Lai’s case confirms that politically, Hong Kong is no longer distinguishable from China […] it’s a blow to hopes of democracy catching on in mainland China,” he said.
Why the sentence matters for business confidence in Hong Kong
Beyond politics and diplomacy, the verdict is reverberating through Hong Kong’s business community.
Veteran investor David Roche suggested before the verdict last year in December that a lenient outcome could have restored confidence in the city.
“That, I think, would help to give the overriding impression and therefore conviction to people in the money business that Hong Kong had returned to its normal, business-driven, dynamic self,” he told CNBC.
Instead, analysts say the sentence reinforces doubts about the independence of Hong Kong’s institutions.
Andrew Collier, senior fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School, described the verdict as damaging for foreign investors.
“People want an independent court system that’s going to protect the rights of citizens and the financial community,” he said in a CNBC report after the December verdict.
He warned that investor confidence could erode further. “If investors are not comfortable with the court system, with cases like Jimmy Lai’s, that’s not good for the future of Hong Kong,” Collier added.
Legal experts have voiced similar concerns. Baroness Kennedy, a barrister at Doughty Street Chambers in London, said the trial could prompt companies to reconsider their presence in Hong Kong.
“It should send a shiver down the backs of those who are doing business with Hong Kong because this is not a place that is going to necessarily be protecting your business interests,” she said in a report by the International Bar Association.
She argued that corporate lawyers should reassess whether their clients’ rights will be safeguarded in the way they expect.
Eric Lai, a senior fellow at Georgetown University’s Center for Asian Law, warned that the erosion of media freedom undermines Hong Kong’s credibility as a financial hub.
“A credible financial hub requires the free flow of information to safeguard a transparent investment environment,” he said in a CNN report.
“With critical media outlets shut down and criminalised, as well as open exchange with foreign officials and policymakers on critical policy affairs being deemed criminal activities, the state of information access and free exchange of ideas and opinions are sharply jeopardised,” he added.
At the same time, he argued that Beijing’s priorities are clear. “It has nothing to do with press freedom because they prioritise the need for safeguarding regime security over freedom of expressing sharp critiques,” he said.
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