In early 2013, Bill Hwang was barred from the US investment business. Authorities alleged his Tiger Asia Management hedge fund had violated promises it made to some of the world’s most powerful investment banks as part of an insider-trading scheme.

A pastor’s son who moved from South Korea to the US as a teenager, Hwang quickly bounced back. Steeping himself in scripture, he set up a family office — Archegos Capital Management — and eventually built up trading positions running into the tens of billions of dollars with Wall Street banks, including some of the ones his old firm was accused of cheating.

In recent days Hwang’s world has unravelled. Banks dumped more than $20bn of stock tied to his derivatives trades, counterparties warned of billions of dollars in potential losses and associates wondered how a quiet, abstentious family man who gave much of his money to Christian causes had wound up as the central figure in a colossal Wall Street mess.