Inter owners Suning suffered a legal and financial blow today, with 5.8% of the company’s assets frozen by order of a Chinese court.

Chinese media outlet Caixing Global report that a Beijing court has frozen the shares due to the company’s inability to keep up with its bill payments.

The 5.8% figure is equal to more than a quarter of the total shares held by founder Zhang Jindong, which total 21% of the company’s shares.

The order is meant to respond to the Chinese company’s liquidity crisis, which is the result of the club’s having taken on large debts between 2015 and 2019 in order to fund the acquisition of large new assets, of which Inter is one.

It is not yet known how this development will affect Suning’s running of the Nerazzurri, although control of the company is not taken out of the Zhang family’s hands by the decision.

This development highlights the underlying problems which have caused the Nerazzurri to face financial difficulties going forward, of which the club’s tightly-budgeted transfer strategy in the summer is one clearly visible manifestation.