Jack Ma Gives Up Control of Ant Group

Ant Group announced Saturday that Jack Ma will no longer be in control of the Chinese fintech giant. The billionaire has no executive job or board seat at Ant but has continued to control the company through other entities. Ant Group is moving to cut its reliance on Ma, the Wall Street Journal reports. Under the agreement, per CNN, Ma and nine other major shareholders will only vote independently, no longer acting as a bloc when exercising their voting rights. That way, the company said, no shareholder would have "sole or joint control over Ant Group."

Ma co-founded Alibaba Group Holding and helped start Ant. Documents show he has held 50.52% of Ant voting rights through Hangzhou Yunbo and two other entities. His voting rights now will drop to 6.2%, per CNN. Ant is in the middle of an overhaul, after Chinese regulators blocked its $37 billion IPO in November 2020 and the company was told to restructure. The regulators did not mandate the change affecting Ma but approved it, per the Journal. The Chinese government's moves against Ant are part of a crackdown to limit the clout of internet giants, per the New York Times. (More Jack Ma stories.)