This story appears in the November 2022 issue of Forbes Asia. Subscribe to Forbes Asia
This story is part of Forbes’ coverage of China’s Richest 2022. See the full list here.
The former high-flying billionaire continues to pull back from the internet empire he cofounded more than 20 years ago amid Beijing’s broad campaign to rein in the country’s internet titans. Ma, China’s fifth richest person with a net worth of $20.6 billion, is planning to give up control of fintech giant Ant Group three years after he stepped down from the helm of e-commerce behemoth Alibaba.
According to Alibaba’s latest annual report, Ma will gradually reduce his direct and indirect economic interest in Ant to no more than 8.8%. The 58-year-old currently controls more than 50% of the Hangzhou-based firm through related investment holding companies, but may transfer some voting power to Ant executives including chief executive Eric Jing, a person with knowledge of the matter told Forbes in July.
The move comes as Ant remakes itself into a financial holding company as required by the country’s central bank, which is stepping up supervision of lending and digital payment apps such as Ant’s Alipay. Its valuation has taken a massive hit—which by some estimates has fallen over 70% to as low as $70 billion—after its $35 billion IPO was torpedoed in late 2020 by China’s financial regulators. The company made a profit of 3.7 billion yuan ($555 million) in the March quarter, down 17% from a year earlier, an Alibaba stock exchange filing shows. Alibaba holds a one-third stake in Ant, and reports the latter’s financial results under equity method investees.
Ma has largely kept out of the public eye for the past two years. Most recently his 88-meter superyacht Zen was spotted in June docking off the Spanish island of Mallorca, followed by Ma’s visit to a Netherlands university to learn about sustainable food production.
Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/ywang/2022/11/09/alibabas-jack-ma-stays-at-no-5-on-chinas-100-richest-2022-despite-a-drop-in-wealth/