Chinese internet entrepreneur Jack Ma’s fortune has plummeted in the aftermath of his contentious remarks regarding the Chinese government and his mysterious absence.
Ma was the richest person in Asia three years ago, with a fortune that peaked at $61.7 billion.
His net worth is now little over $30 billion, with his fortune plunging by nearly $4 billion in the last week alone.
The 58-year-old, who failed his college entrance exam twice and was turned down for a slew of jobs before founding e-commerce behemoth Alibaba from his apartment in 1999, has amassed a fortune through Alibaba and its online payment provider Ant Group.
The two companies have been at the center of Chinese government investigations in recent years, after Ma’s open criticism of China’s financial regulators for being overly risk-averse and accusing the country’s banks of functioning with a “pawnshop mentality.”
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Due to tremendous pressure from Beijing, Ant Group’s record-breaking $34.5 billion IPO was canceled at the last minute, Ma relinquished leadership of the fintech behemoth, and Alibaba was hit with a $2.8 billion antitrust penalties.
Last week, China’s banking regulators claimed they were closing up their probe into Ant and fined the fintech business over $1 billion for violating consumer protection and corporate governance standards. According to the news agency Reuters, it was one of the most severe punishments ever imposed on a Chinese internet corporation.
According to Bloomberg, Ma’s 9.9% stake in Ant is now worth $4 billion less than it was a year ago, with the company’s valuation falling from $315 billion ahead of its IPO to roughly $78.5 billion.
If the company’s massive public debut had gone ahead, Ma’s net worth would have skyrocketed, pushing him to the top of the list of the world’s wealthiest people. In 2014, Alibaba had the world’s largest ever IPO, raising $25 billion on its first public offering in New York.
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However, Beijing’s campaign has had the opposite impact, with the companies Ma established reportedly losing $850 billion as a result of the regulatory crackdown.
Ma has returned to his pre-Alibaba career of teaching since becoming mired in scandal in China.
The billionaire has accepted two temporary teaching positions: one at the University of Tokyo for the summer and one at the University of Hong Kong for three years. Last month, he conducted his first session on innovation and entrepreneurship in Japan’s capital.
Ma’s participation at the institution piqued people’s interest after his run-in with the Chinese authorities resulted in his absence from public view. His disappearance sparked allegations that he had been kept under house arrest, with some even questioning his survival.
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Ma’s public appearances have been sporadic since resurfacing in a video released by Chinese state media in early 2021, with the entrepreneur—once known for his flamboyance and quirky publicity stunts—making headlines when he showed up in Thailand, Mallorca, and his hometown, as well as at an Alibaba event.
Last month, at the VivaTech conference in Paris, Alibaba president Michael Evans sought to reassure people concerned about Ma’s whereabouts that the enigmatic founder was “alive” and “happy.”