Alibaba shares are on the floor after rumors of a character being arrested

The city government of Hangzhou, China has just announced the arrest of a man surnamed Ma. Notably, Hangzhou is home to the headquarters of many large technology corporations in China, including Alibaba and Ant Group founded by billionaire Jack Ma (Ma Van).

According to CCTV, although the man’s identity has not been revealed, he has been imposed a restraining order since April 25. He was charged with incitement to overthrow the government and endanger national security.

This information caused Alibaba’s share price on the Hong Kong exchange to plunge, down 9%, Bloomberg said.

On China’s Weibo forum, many users are also discussing the arrest of businessman Ma. Some pointed out that Jack Ma just appeared at the Hangzhou business conference at the end of April, so the possibility of him being arrested is low.

Some users even believe that the person arrested is Ma Huateng (Ma Huateng), the founder of Tencent. However, Tencent headquarters is located in Shenzhen, not Hangzhou.

The CCTV report was later edited, the name of the arrested person was changed to “Ma Mo Mo”. However, Weibo users still think that this person may be Ma Van, the real name of the father of the e-commerce empire Alibaba.

Previously, Jack Ma disappeared from public view during the last three months of 2020, after criticizing China’s corporate policies and saying that constant US surveillance would stifle innovation in the country.

Since making this controversial statement, Ant Group, the billionaire’s business empire, has been targeted by Chinese authorities, leading to the halt of a record IPO. 37 billion USD of this corporation.

In April, China’s Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI), China’s top anti-corruption agency, said it was directly investigating the influence of the billionaire’s fintech empire. Jack Ma, including transactions between Ant Corporation and banks and state-owned enterprises.

The commission also arrested and expelled the former Party Secretary of Hangzhou City, Zhou Jiangyong, for corruption. He faces charges of taking advantage of his position and accepting huge bribes over the past 20 years. In particular, some investigative evidence has shown that the former Party Secretary of Hangzhou used his influence to help businesses, including Jack Ma’s Ant Group.