Jack Ma used to be consistently the richest man in China. However, the title is no longer in his hands because his wealth has decreased after being slapped by the government of President Xi Jinping.
Jack Ma's decline in wealth is a direct result of Alibaba's lackluster stock price. Alibaba has also come under pressure from the Chinese government, and was even fined for violating antitrust rules.
Most recently, Alibaba announced that its financial performance was quite disappointing as well as cut their revenue projections for next year due to weak market conditions. This made Alibaba's share price plunged to 11%.
Investors are worried that Alibaba will feel much of the impact of the raids by the Chinese government which in addition to targeting them, also other giant companies such as property company Evergrande. This may be a domino effect where consumers in China are reducing spending.
The decline in Alibaba's stock price cut Jack Ma's fortune by USD 350 million, where his current total wealth according to Forbes is around USD 38.6 billion. This means that in the last year, Jack Ma's assets have decreased by a total of around USD 30 billion.
"Jack Ma's fortune has dropped dramatically from its peak. In the past, Jack Ma's fortune was USD 66.6 billion when Alibaba's shares hit a high of around USD 317 per share in October 2020," Forbes said.
Jack Ma is now impressed that he doesn't really take care of his business. He has also been out of public appearances for a long time since the Xi Jinping administration has restricted his career and that of his company.
Jack Ma who used to be known for being flamboyant and can be said to be a sissy appeared. He likes kung fu, likes to sing at official events, and even becomes a movie star. But now the situation seems to be much different.
He has always been the subject of news because of his outspoken and sometimes witty speech. Inspirational sentences also often come out of his lips which become the grip of many people.
"If you want to be successful, then you must have a very good emotional quotient (EQ). Because you will understand how to work with other people. No matter how smart you are, if you can't work together, you will never be successful," he said several times. time ago.
He also often makes fun of himself so that he seems humble. "I'm not good at Maths, I've never studied management and still stutter at reading accounting reports," said Jack Ma admitting his weakness.
"Even to this day, I still don't understand what coding is. I still don't understand the technology behind the internet," he said again on one occasion.
Jack Ma loves to sing and once rocked an Alibaba event attended by thousands of his employees. In 2017, Jack Ma, played a feature film where he competed acting with a number of big names in the Chinese film world.
In the film Gong Shou Dao or The Art of Attach and Defense, Jack plays with Jet Li, Donnie Yen, Sammo Hung, and a number of other players.
Now he hasn't looked like that in over a year, though he may still want to. Practically since he was banned by the Chinese government for his speech criticizing his country's financial system, he never spoke much again. Jack ma gradually changed.
Jack Ma's new mission seems to be to support education in rural China as well as farmers, while keeping a low profile. This he specifically wrote in a letter sent to Xi Jinping.
"He wrote directly to Xi earlier this year offering to devote his whole life to educating rural people, according to a government source who said the president discussed the letter," Reuters wrote.