Hong Kong, Jan. 29 -- In a setback for China's real estate sector, the Hong Kong court ordered the under-debt real estate company Evergrande to liquidate after two years of running out of cash and defaulting in 2021, The New York Times reported on Monday.

The order will set off a race by lawyers to find and grab anything belonging to Evergrande that can be sold.

It reported that after the company defaulted in 2021, investors around the world scooped up the property developer's discounted IOUs, betting that the Chinese government would eventually step in to bail it out.

Evergrande is a real estate developer with more than USD 300 billion in debt, sitting in the middle of the world's biggest housing crisis. There isn't much left in its s...