In addition to accusations against Ant over issues relating to governance, compliance and regulatory arbitrage, regulators have also come after Alibaba Antitrust Probe over monopolistic practices.
A crackdown by Chinese regulators on Alibaba’s fintech empire has prompted worries across the technology sector, and resulted in a $200 billion sell-off.
Alibaba Antitrust Probe and its three largest rivals — Tencent, food delivery giant Meituan and JD.com — have shed nearly $200 billion in Hong Kong over two sessions since Thursday, when regulators revealed an investigation into alleged monopolistic practices at Jack Ma’s Alibaba.
On Sunday, Chinese regulators have instructed Ant Group to overhaul its operations, which includes credit, insurance, and wealth management services, asking it to set up a separate financial holdings company to ensure sufficient capital and data privacy protection.
In addition to accusations against Ant over issues relating to governance, compliance and regulatory arbitrage, regulators have also come after Alibaba over monopolistic practices. The company has grown from a digital payments platform to a sprawling financial empire that operates China’s most popular digital wallet.
Founder Advised to Stay
Just yesterday, finews.asia reported that Beijing has come at Ma directly and advised him not to leave the country.
Ant’s founder has not been seen in the public spotlight since October, when he publicly criticized China’s regulators and banks, which resulted in China’s decision to stop what would have been the world’s biggest IPO.
Originally published at Finews Asia