Business

Jack Ma cedes control of Chinese fintech company Ant Group

Ma has largely disappeared from public view since he criticized Chinese regulators two years ago

January 7, 2023

Jack Ma will end an acting-in-concert pact with three executives which gave Ma 53.46% of the voting power in the fintech company

As per the media reports, billionaire Jack Ma has given away the control of Ant Group in a bid to restructure China’s largest fintech company and put it back on the path for an initial public offering (IPO).

The overhauling of Ant Group’s shareholding structure dilutes the voting power of its founder Ma to make China’s largest fintech company more “transparent and diversified“.

According to the South China Morning Post, Ma will end an “acting-in-concert pact” with Ant’s chairman Eric Jing, former chief executive Simon Hu and Alibaba Group Holding veteran Jiang Fang.

The pact had given Ma 53.46 percent of the voting power in the fintech company, according to a company statement.

In November 2020, the Chinese regulators forced Ant Group to axe its world record-setting $39.7 billion IPO in Shanghai and Hong Kong. Ma and other top executives were summoned to meet regulators.

The company said that after the restructuring, major shareholders of Ant “will independently exercise their voting rights”.

“No shareholder will, alone or jointly with another shareholder, have the power to control the outcome of Ant’s general meetings or nominate the majority of Ant’s board of directors and therefore have control over Ant,” the company informed.

The billionaire has gone into hiding after a regulatory crackdown in China amid the massive Covid surge in the country. Ma has largely disappeared from public view since he criticized Chinese regulators two years ago.

[With Inputs from IANS]

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