Jack Ma And Other Chinese Moguls Who Have Mysteriously Dropped Off The Radar

News of Alibaba cofounder Jack Ma’s disappearance from public view has driven heated speculation across social media in recent days. The whereabouts of the billionaire entrepreneur are unknown and Alibaba isn’t commenting. 

Formerly China’s richest person, Ma’s last public sighting was at Shanghai’s Bund Summit in late October, where he criticized Chinese regulators for stifling innovation. By early November, he was reportedly summoned to a meeting with Chinese authorities, who then pulled the plug on the planned IPO of his fintech giant, Ant Group, on November 3,  just two days before it was slated to begin trading. Alibaba is now under investigation for monopolistic behavior, according to a statement from the government’s market supervision arm.  And the billionaire has not been spotted since late October. Alibaba and Ant Group did not respond to Forbes’ request for comment. In a report on Tuesday, citing a person familiar with the matter, CNBC reported that Ma was not missing, just laying low.

Ma’s absence from the public sphere is part of a larger pattern. As Forbes has reported before, in recent years at least half a dozen other billionaires and wealthy businessmen have vanished from public life for a period of time after running afoul of the Chinese Communist Party. In December 2015, reports emerged that Guo Guangchang, founder and chairman of investment conglomerate Fosun International, had gone missing. Social media posts claimed that witnesses saw Guo being taken away by the police at Shanghai’s airport.  

Often called China’s Warren Buffett, Guo built his Hong Kong listed firm into a $115 billion (assets) giant with investments across Asia, Europe and North America. The firm temporarily suspended trading of its stock after news broke, and said that Guo was assisting judiciary authorities with unnamed investigations. Guo later returned to the company and no other explanation was given, though his disappearance came amid a corruption crackdown campaign that President Xi Jinping initiated after he rose to power in 2012. Guo, who has a current net worth of $7.5 billion, still chairs Fosun today.

In January 2016, fast fashion firm Shanghai Metersbonwe Fashion & Accessories also temporarily halted trading of its stock, saying in a filing that it was unable to reach its billionaire founder, Zhou Chengjian. State-run news group China Daily reported that Zhou was detained by the police to help with a potential insider trading and stock manipulation case. Metersbonwe said in a filing to the Shenzhen Stock Exchange a week later that Zhou was back at work, but did not elaborate on what had happened. A rags to riches story, Zhou reportedly quit school at age 12 and tried his hand at carpentry and bricklaying before training as a tailor. He later started Metersbonwe, which boasts over $800 million in 2019 revenue. His daughter now chairs the company, though Zhou remains its biggest shareholder, and has a fortune of $1.3 billion. 

Other businessmen have disappeared more recently. Real estate mogul Ren Zhiqiang reportedly went missing in March after publishing an online essay that blasted the Chinese government’s handling of the Covid-19 pandemic. Although he didn’t mention Xi by name, he referenced the Chinese leader several times and called him a “clown.” A friend of his told the New York Times in March 2020 that they were “very worried” and were looking for him. The government announced in July that Ren — reportedly a longtime Communist Party member and the son of a former party official — had been expelled from the party. His assets were seized and he was sentenced in September to 18 years in prison for taking bribes and misusing his power as the head of a state owned real estate group, among other charges. His supporters claim that he was punished for speaking out against Xi.

Another high flying executive, investment firm Tomorrow Group’s Xiao Jianhua, was snatched from Hong Kong with little explanation. In January 2017, Xiao was reportedly taken from a Four Season Hotel in a wheelchair with his head covered (he was not known to use a wheelchair); he was then whisked across the border to mainland China. Tomorrow Group reportedly said in a deleted WeChat statement in July 2020 that Xiao has been in China cooperating with authorities on investigations into the company. The government has taken over more than half a dozen businesses connected to the Tomorrow Group, accusing some of the companies of hiding information about their firm’s controlling shareholder and shareholdings. Xiao, who was supposedly well connected to China’s political elites and facilitated business transactions for them, has not reappeared in the public’s eye. A spokesperson for Tomorrow Group could not be reached for comment.