[Epoch Times, August 24, 2021]Since Alibaba was suppressed in October last year, its founder Jack Ma has almost completely disappeared from public view. Foreign media reported that as Alibaba grew bigger and bigger, Jack Ma became more courageous. Over the years, he has challenged the CCP authorities and even upset Xi Jinping face to face.
Jack Ma tried to ease the situation after challenging the CCP’s regulatory system to no avail
After Ma Yun criticized the Chinese Communist Party’s regulatory system in October last year, the authorities took a heavy blow against Alibaba, shelved the initial public offering (IPO) plan of its Ant Group, launched an antitrust investigation against Alibaba, and launched an antitrust investigation on April 10. The sky-high ticket of 18.228 billion yuan.
The Wall Street Journal reported on August 24 that Jack Ma accused the Chinese Communist Party’s regulators of stifling financial innovation last year. A few days later, Xi Jinping personally intervened and halted the initial public offering of over 34 billion U.S. dollars in Ant Group, a financial technology company under Ma Yun’s command. Since then, the Ant Group was forced to reorganize its business.
In August last year, Ant Group disclosed detailed financial data for the first time when it submitted its IPO prospectus. Some regulators were caught off guard seeing that Ant’s loan business had grown to such a large scale.
The report said that just the night before Jack Ma gave a speech in October last year blaming the regulators, he reminded employees that he was prepared to criticize the regulators. People who know Jack Ma said that he has turned a deaf ear to the CCP’s warnings for many years.
People familiar with Jack Ma’s activities said that Jack Ma had traveled to Beijing to try to ease the situation. But officials said these moves came too late and were of no avail.
Early recognition by CCP officials, Jack Ma is getting bolder and bolder
In 1999, Jack Ma launched Alibaba, a B2B platform. Since then, many senior CCP officials have begun to approve and applaud his actions. A former Zhejiang official recalled that Xi Jinping had encouraged companies like Alibaba to expand because these companies benefited the “national”.
In 2007, Xi Jinping left Zhejiang to serve as secretary of the Shanghai Municipal Party Committee. According to official media reports, he visited Alibaba and asked, “Is it possible to develop in Shanghai.”
The report pointed out that with success, Jack Ma became more and more bold. He vigorously promoted Alipay, an online payment service created for Alibaba’s e-commerce platform, even if this service threatened the dominance of the Chinese Communist Party’s state-owned banks.
Ma Yun said that Chinese banks have not done enough to support small and micro enterprises because they are too concerned about state-owned enterprises. Jack Ma said at a meeting in 2008: If the bank does not change, we will change the bank.
Jack Ma has repeatedly challenged the CCP authorities
After Xi Jinping assumed office in 2013, he emphasized that “state-owned enterprises must not only be weakened, but must be strengthened.”
Ma Yun claimed that it feels good to make Chinese state-owned enterprises feel uneasy. In a TV interview in the United States in 2015, he said that if anyone wants to go to jail for Alipay, let him go.
The CCP’s market supervision department issued a report in 2015 stating that many products sold on Taobao were fake, defective or contraband. Some products infringe trademark rights.
In this regard, Alibaba threatened to formally complain. Ma Yun also flew to Beijing for this and met with the then head of the State Administration for Industry and Commerce who issued this report. Later that day, the State Administration for Industry and Commerce withdrew the report from its website and stated that the report was essentially the minutes of the administrative guidance symposium and had no legal effect.
The government’s retreat has left many people with the impression that “Alibaba is strong enough to challenge the government.” Jack Ma also said in an interview in 2017 that entrepreneurs will always be one step ahead of regulators, and we must do this.
Ma Yun makes Xi Jinping “unhappy”
According to the report, in September 2015, at a symposium in Seattle, Xi Jinping, who was on a state visit to the United States, gathered with executives of well-known companies in the United States and China, including celebrities such as Jack Ma. At that time, everyone had 3 minutes to speak in front of Xi Jinping. But among the participants, only Jack Ma’s speech lasted 10 minutes.
A person familiar with Xi Jinping’s views said that Xi Jinping was “definitely unhappy” at the time.
In 2018, Xi Jinping hosted a symposium on private enterprises in Beijing. About 50 entrepreneurs were invited to participate, and Jack Ma was not among them.
In the summer of 2020, Jack Ma invited the medical team from Anhui Province to help Hubei to eat hot pot in Hefei to show his gratitude. The local media referred to him as “Teacher Ma” in a report.
According to a person familiar with the matter, the top leaders of the Chinese Communist Party are very annoyed. Some officials believe that as Jack Ma, he should not thank the frontline workers.
The Central Bank of the Communist Party of China, the China Banking Regulatory Commission, and the State Administration for Market Regulation and other government agencies involved in overseeing Alibaba did not respond to a request for comment from a reporter from the Wall Street Journal. The State Council Information Office of the Communist Party of China also did not respond to written questions.
Editor in charge: Lin Congwen
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