Seven e-commerce platforms including Pinduoduo were penalized. The administrative penalty decision mentioned that Pinduoduo used violent and soft resistance tactics to obstruct law enforcement during the investigation. More details were exposed by mainland official media.
On April 17, the State Administration for Market Regulation of China imposed a fine of 35.97 billion yuan on seven e-commerce platforms for “Ghost Delivery”, with Shanghai Dream Information Technology Co., Ltd. (the main operator of Pinduoduo) receiving over 15.14 billion yuan in fines. In addition, the founder and legal representative of Pinduoduo, Zhao Jiazhen, was personally fined 6.9373 million yuan.
This is the highest fine Pinduoduo has ever faced since its establishment.
The official punishment decision on Pinduoduo stated that among the operators of cream cake businesses on Pinduoduo’s platform operated by Dream Company, as many as 4,522 cream cake operators did not upload their food business operation permits, and 4,941 others uploaded permits that did not cover cream cakes, totaling 9,463 violations entering the Pinduoduo platform.
The direct cause of Pinduoduo’s fine was a serious dereliction of duty in the qualification audit of the food operation. However, it is noteworthy that this fine also implicates the scandal of Pinduoduo’s violent “opposition to the law”.
“Xinhua Viewpoint” posted on April 19th indicated that the investigation process was “not easy”: “Some platforms intentionally delayed and refused to cooperate under the pretext of ‘system upgrades’ and ‘sensitive data’, while others provided fragmented and encoded data in an attempt to cover up the facts; furthermore, some resorted to direct violence and opposition to the law – a law enforcement officer of the Pinduoduo task force suffered a fractured left index finger and soft tissue injuries to the right ankle because corporate employees deliberately closed the door.”
This issue has sparked discussions on social media platforms. Some netizens expressed that Pinduoduo has been “protected” by the authorities for too long, accustomed to selling fake goods and being arrogant.
In fact, rumors about Pinduoduo’s violent opposition to the law began circulating as early as the end of last year.
In early December last year, news of a physical clash between office staff at Pinduoduo in Shanghai and officials from the Shanghai Market Supervision Bureau continued to ferment. Several well-known Chinese tech influencers were discussing this matter on a social media platform consisting mainly of Chinese tech industry professionals.
Caixin Net reported that on December 3, 2025, personnel from the Shanghai Market Supervision and Administration Bureau, referred by the State Administration for Market Supervision and Administration, conducted an investigation at Pinduoduo’s Shanghai headquarters, leading to a physical altercation between both parties, prompting the market supervision personnel to call the police.
According to Bloomberg, after the incident, the police arrested several individuals involved. Authorities detained several Pinduoduo employees on administrative detention and other measures citing obstruction of duty.
Reports indicate that full-blown physical altercations between employees of large Chinese companies and regulatory personnel are extremely rare. Nevertheless, this incident may heighten concerns among investors about the increased scrutiny Pinduoduo may face in the future.
Pinduoduo Holdings is known for its Pinduoduo e-commerce platform and Temu e-shopping service launched overseas. Despite counterfeit goods rampant on Pinduoduo, the Communist Party does not penalize it, indicating strong backing. Pinduoduo, along with the fast-fashion e-commerce platform Shein, exports goods to the European and American markets, attracting high scrutiny from regulatory agencies in Europe.
Insiders stated that last week, the European Union agency responsible for managing commercial competition conducted a surprise search of the company’s European operational headquarters in Dublin, suspecting that Temu may have received subsidies from the Chinese authorities, causing unfair competition without prior notification.