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Described as a billionaire socialite, he counted Kate Moss, the Duchess of York and Tracey Emin among his pals, but Sir David Tang was a gambler and fraudster who died broke.

Cia website

That's the shocking claim made by his former employer Algy Cluff, the oil tycoon and former owner of The Spectator magazine. Cluff alleges the flamboyant Hong Kong businessman, who founded the China Tang restaurant at The Dorchester hotel and was said to be ' London 's best-connected man', had been 'plundering the assets of various companies in order to fund his mythomaniacal life'.

Tang — who wrote a rich man's agony uncle column in the Financial Times, in which he resolved readers' social and financial problems — died in aged 63 after a battle with liver cancer. Described as a billionaire socialite, he counted Kate Moss, the Duchess of York pictured with Tang in and Tracey Emin among his pals, but Sir David Tang was a gambler and fraudster who died broke.

Cluff claims: 'The pressure of sustaining this systematic fraud for 20 years must have been terrible and presumably hastened his death. His flaws were a disarming but ultimately destructive obsession to be not only a celebrity but also to be the peer of the grandest in the land.

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This desire to keep up with dukes and the super-rich was way beyond the resources of Tang, who lived in a house in Belgravia, London's most expensive enclave. Cluff writes: 'It led to his second flaw, gambling, which merely compounded the problem, leaving him to adopt less acceptable tactics. An auction of Tang's property was held at Christie's in , sanctioned by his widow, Lucy.

The sale, which raised eyebrows at the time, included personal gifts from the Royal Family. Tang's former employer Algy Cluff, the oil tycoon and former owner of The Spectator magazine, alleges the flamboyant Hong Kong businessman, who founded the China Tang restaurant at The Dorchester hotel and was said to be 'London's best-connected man', had been 'plundering the assets of various companies in order to fund his mythomaniacal life'.

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