Hou added that such large cash transfers are “beyond normal course of business” and comparable to “TuSimple China’s heyday of operation when it was operating a large autonomous truck fleet in Shanghai” and had around 700 employees on its payroll. As of September, TuSimple China had around 200 employees.

The window of opportunity for shareholders like Hou to get what they want — which is for TuSimple to liquidate so they can recuperate some of their losses — is narrowing.