By Mark Gregory BBC world service business correspondent

The main defendant, Si Xue, cheated stock market investors

In Southern China, on the island of Hainan, the trial has begun of 25 people accused of carrying out a $3.15bn fraud.

It is said to be one of the largest embezzlement cases since the communists took power in China in 1949.

China's economic miracle, it seems, has been accompanied by an equally spectacular growth in fraud by officials and people in business.

But the amounts of money allegedly involved in this case are large even by China's dizzying standards.

Enzio Von Pfiel of Commerical Economics Asia told the BBC's World Business Report that big-money interests are rarely scrutinised by the Chinese authorities.

"There's simply too much money it," he said. "Crime pays."

Defendents

The trial is also notable for the amount of legal effort that has gone into it - the defendents have hired 41 lawyers to work on their side of the case.

The main defendent is a former stock broker Si Xue who ran various companies including one called Dalian Securities, which was closed down by the authorities two years ago.

According to reports in official Chinese media, he and other executives from several different broking firms are accused of embezzling government money and issuing fake contracts.

They also allegedly cheated investors by spending money meant for buying goverment bonds on risky property and share transactions that later went badly wrong.

The trial, scheduled to last a week, is taking place in Haikou, capital of the tropical island of Hainan off Southern China.