Louis Koo sued
In early September, actor Louis Koo suddenly got involved in a civil lawsuit with an amount of up to 149 million HKD (about 495 billion VND).
According to the file submitted to the Hong Kong High Court (China), the plaintiff is Sino Hero Ventures Limited, a company registered in the British Virgin Islands. Defendants include One Cool Group Film Production Co., Ltd. and Co Thien Lac personally.
The plaintiff said that the two sides signed a term loan agreement in September 2019, according to which the plaintiff lent HKD 70 million, with a repayment term in September of the following year; interest rate 12%/year, and increased to 18% if overdue.
Co Thien Lac's company started paying debt in installments from 2022. But according to the plaintiff, as of August 28, 2026, the amount of unpaid principal and interest still amounted to 149,382,227 HKD. Therefore, on September 2, they officially filed a petition to the court to request the recovery of this amount.
After the incident was announced, it quickly attracted attention. Chinese media directly described this as a sign that Louis Koo is facing a "financial crisis".
On the evening of September 3rd, Louis Koo attended a public dinner party but did not mention being asked for debt. Instead, he dedicated emotional words of remembrance to veteran actor Liu Zhaoming who just passed away on September 2nd.
On September 4, Thien Ha Nhat had an official response to the lawsuit, the company disagreed with the plaintiff's one-sided interpretation.
Thien Ha Nhat emphasized that the details of the case presented by the plaintiff are "incomplete".
An important point mentioned by the company is that the plaintiff did not publicly disclose that this business had been removed from the registered list and dissolved for nearly 3 years. Thien Ha Nhat said that during that time, the company could not contact any authorized representatives of the plaintiff.
Information between the two sides has a clear difference in the reason for the prolonged debt that has not been paid for many years as well as what happened during the contact process.
Pressure from the Hong Kong (China) film market
The lawsuit received special attention also because of Louis Koo's position in the Hong Kong (China) film industry in recent years.
Thien Ha Nhat was established in 2013, with Co Thien Lac as one of the founders, owning 90% of the shares. The company's operations have long been limited to film production but also include investment, production, film distribution, post-production, visual effects and artist management and many other fields.
According to 163, the debt of 149 million HKD not only exposes the problem of Co Thien Lac company, but also exposes the cover-up of the "star-centered" model that has existed for a long time in the Hong Kong (China) film industry.
As the market changed, Hong Kong (China) film box office revenue decreased from about HKD 2 billion in 2015 to under HKD 1 billion in 2025.
Louis Koo heavily invested in many large-budget films such as "Minh Nhat Chien Ky", "Cuu Long Thanh Tram: Vay Thanh", "Tam Tan Ky", "Ngay Mai Binh Yen"... However, the ability to recover capital from the box office is often not as expected.
The high-intensity working model when Louis Koo acted in more than ten films each year finally began to meet limits.
