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    In Xi Jinping’s China, Success Is Getting More Dangerous

    CEFC Energy appears to have joined the ranks of big, privately held Chinese conglomerates that have run afoul of the changing political environment

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    Deng Xiaoping, the grandfather of China’s economic transformation, liked to say it didn’t matter what color a corporate feline was—state owned or private—as long as it caught mice. In the Xi Jinping era, being a privately owned fat cat is getting increasingly dangerous.

    The latest evidence of that came Thursday, when the respected online financial magazine Caixin reported that the chairman of the acquisitive privately held conglomerate CEFC China Energy, Ye Jianming, is under investigation. That comes less than a week after...