Report: Alibaba Mogul Jack Ma Self-Exiled to Japan After Communist Crackdown

The Financial Times revealed on Wednesday that Jack Ma, the formerly flamboyant billionaire founder of Internet giant Alibaba, has been living in apparently self-imposed exile in Japan for at least the past six months.

Ma, once a ubiquitous celebrity presence in China, vanished from the public eye after criticizing hidebound Chinese Communist regulators at a Shanghai forum in October 2020, and a subsequent crackdown on high-flying tech entrepreneurs wiped out much of his vast wealth.

Ma’s troubles began in 2020 after he critiqued the Chinese government as too heavy-handed in its regulatory approach to the fast-moving tech industry. The regime decided to prove him right by launching the heaviest-handed regulatory crackdown since the dawn of the Information Age.

Ma memorably slammed the Chinese banking industry for having a “pawnshop mentality” by proceeding slowly, cautiously, and clumsily when the tech industry needed loans. The price of his irreverent quotability was watching his planned $37 billion stock offering vanish in a cloud of regulatory smoke, as ordered by dictator Xi Jinping. Alibaba was later slapped with a record-breaking $2.8 billion in antitrust fines.

Ma himself disappeared, inaugurating an eerie season of silence from the guy who announced his retirement as Alibaba CEO in 2019 by renting out an 80,000-seat stadium and taking the stage with a guitar and a hair-metal wig. He was even airbrushed out of a talent show he was well-known for hosting, replaced by an anonymous Alibaba junior executive without a word of explanation.

A greatly chastened Ma resurfaced a few months later, but his public appearances remained low-key and limited. No official accounting of his disappearance was ever provided, although his financial services company Ant Group muttered something about his sudden enthusiasm for quiet philanthropic endeavors.

According to the Financial Times, Ma, his family, and his personal chef decamped for Japan halfway through 2022, with some side trips to the United States, Spain, the Netherlands, and Israel. 

Ma’s departure from China helped him escape from the crazed coronavirus lockdowns that hobbled the Chinese economy and recently sparked unprecedented protests against Communist Party rule. The Times of India (TOI) noted on Wednesday that Alibaba posted its first flat revenue growth in August due to the lockdown slowdown, and Alibaba risks being delisted on U.S. exchanges if it fails to comply with disclosure requirements.

Even in his Tokyo exile, Ma has reportedly been keeping a low profile for a man who still commands a considerable fortune, and could have the media spotlight any time he wants it.

The Financial Times reports:

His social activities center around a small handful of private members’ clubs, with one based in the heart of Tokyo’s swish Ginza district and another in the Marunouchi financial district facing the Imperial Palace.

The exclusive Ginza-based club has become a busy but discreet social centre for wealthy Chinese who have either settled in Tokyo or are on extended visits, according to members.

People involved in Japan’s modern art scene said that Ma had become an enthusiastic collector. Friends close to the billionaire in China said he had turned to painting watercolors to pass the time after being forced to retreat from his frenetic public life jet-setting between meetings with top officials in China and around the globe.

Although the official narrative about Ma said he was putting more effort into philanthropy, his Jack Ma Foundation has reduced its profile as well. The Financial Times noted the foundation has not used its Twitter account since the Chinese regulatory crackdown on tech companies began in November 2020.

Real Money on Wednesday mused that the discovery that “China’s most-famous entrepreneur has become an economic exile” might have been a much bigger story if the death of former Chinese leader Jiang Zemin had not dominated the news. 

Ma’s exile could be a sign that other Chinese tech moguls still do not feel comfortable with Xi Jinping’s government, especially with anti-lockdown protests making the Communist regime nervous about its grip on power. Ma’s Ant Group is preparing to pay a billion-dollar fine that will theoretically conclude its regulatory ordeal, and Alibaba shares are already rising in anticipation.

“Entrepreneurs, though, still aren’t sure China under Xi is ready to welcome them back into the fold. They’re certainly not the heroes of the ‘China dream’ that they became in a very different era under Jiang,” Real Money observed, remarking on Jack Ma’s apparent preference for living in Japan.