THE BILLIONAIRE brothers who run Hong Kong’s largest property company were arrested yesterday in connection with a corruption investigation that has stunned the territory’s business community.

Raymond and Thomas Kwok, who took control of Sun Hung Kai Properties after their octogenarian mother retired last year, are the most prominent tycoons yet to be arrested by the city’s powerful Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC).

Rafael Hui, Hong Kong’s second highest-ranking official from 2005 to 2007, was also arrested in the same case, according to local media reports.

Neither Mr Hui nor the Kwok brothers, whose family wealth exceeds $15 billion according to Forbes magazine, have been charged.

The ICAC declined to comment on the investigation, saying only that “two senior executives of a listed company . . . and a former principal official of the Hong Kong government have been arrested for corruption”.

Thomas Chan, a Sun Hung Kai executive director, was arrested by the commission last week, although he was also not charged.

The board of Sun Hung Kai, which had sales of HK$62.6 billion (US$8bn) last year, held an emergency board meeting at which it was decided that the Kwoks would continue to serve as joint chairmen and managing directors.

“The board has resolved that it is in the best interests of the company for Messrs Thomas and Raymond Kwok to continue to undertake and discharge their duties to the group, including their duties as joint chairmen and managing directors of the company,” the company said in a statement to the Hong Kong stock exchange.

Sun Hung Kai’s shares, which were suspended, will resume trading today. – (Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2012)