China Targets Jack Ma's Alibaba Empire in Monopoly Probe (bloomberg.com) 63
China kicked off an investigation into alleged monopolistic practices at Alibaba Group and summoned affiliate Ant Group to a high-level meeting over financial regulations, escalating scrutiny over the twin pillars of billionaire Jack Ma's internet empire. From a report: The probe announced Thursday marks the formal start of the Communist Party's crackdown on the crown jewel of Ma's sprawling dominion, spanning everything from e-commerce to logistics and social media. The pressure on Ma is central to a broader effort to rein in an increasingly influential internet sphere: Draft anti-monopoly rules released November gave the government wide latitude to restrain entrepreneurs who until recently enjoyed unusual freedom to expand their realms. Once hailed as drivers of economic prosperity and symbols of the country's technological prowess, Alibaba and rivals like Tencent Holdings face increasing pressure from regulators after amassing hundreds of millions of users and gaining influence over almost every aspect of daily life in China.
The State Administration for Market Regulation is investigating Alibaba, the top antitrust watchdog said in a statement without further details. Regulators including the central bank and banking watchdog will separately summon affiliate Ant to a meeting intended to drive home increasingly stringent financial regulations, which now pose a threat to the growth of the world's biggest online financial services firm. Ant said in a statement on its official WeChat account it will study and comply with all requirements. Ma, the flamboyant co-founder of Alibaba and Ant, has all but vanished from public view since Ant's initial public offering got derailed last month. As of early December, the man most closely identified with the meteoric rise of China was advised by the government to stay in the country, a person familiar with the matter has said.
The State Administration for Market Regulation is investigating Alibaba, the top antitrust watchdog said in a statement without further details. Regulators including the central bank and banking watchdog will separately summon affiliate Ant to a meeting intended to drive home increasingly stringent financial regulations, which now pose a threat to the growth of the world's biggest online financial services firm. Ant said in a statement on its official WeChat account it will study and comply with all requirements. Ma, the flamboyant co-founder of Alibaba and Ant, has all but vanished from public view since Ant's initial public offering got derailed last month. As of early December, the man most closely identified with the meteoric rise of China was advised by the government to stay in the country, a person familiar with the matter has said.
We'll fabricate something and arrest you soon, ok? (Score:3, Insightful)
You can't get as much social power as the state, mmm'kay?
Re: We'll fabricate something and arrest you soon, (Score:2)
This will back fire hard on China. Everyone knows if you need shit manufactured cheap in China (which is to say pretty much everything), you start your search on Alibaba and that service facilitates the introductions needed to get the process going. Killing that would be an act of economic madness.
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Re: We'll fabricate something and arrest you soon, (Score:4, Informative)
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>"If China's Government Bureaucracy is anything like the Government Bureaucracy elsewhere, transferring leadership to the Government would be a veritable death sentence"
Indeed. China is faced with the reality that you can't have the benefits of being free without freedom. They want it both ways, and they are incompatible. In the West, we have been expecting China to eventually implode based on that fact.... expecting they will either move forward with freedom and prosperity, or backwards into totalita
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China has 5,000 years of experience governing and has records of all the various different experiments made along the way. They're not flying by the seat of their pants on this like Western governments tend to do.
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You seem to have an delusional image of China being one entity having sailed through 1000s of years of history.
It is not.
https://supchina.com/2020/12/1... [supchina.com]
Re: We'll fabricate something and arrest you soon (Score:1)
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This will back fire hard on China. Everyone knows if you need shit manufactured cheap in China (which is to say pretty much everything), you start your search on Alibaba and that service facilitates the introductions needed to get the process going. Killing that would be an act of economic madness.
The ruling elite are not too worried about economics - they can make themselves super-rich from a peasant-filled backwater if there's a billion peasants to fuck over. What they can't do is allow an alternative powerbase to form in the country. So, it's bye-bye Alibaba.
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For the last 50 centuries there's been an economic upheaval in China every couple of generations. Afterwards they get up, dust themselves off, and continue on being China.
When you think your life stinks... (Score:2)
If you have little else to be thankful for this holiday season, revel in these two things:
1) You are not under investigation in China, and, 2) very soon, your rather simple existence may be the envy of a multi-billionaire.
Oh the irony (Score:2)
Oh the irony of China -- a country with a monopoly on power over more than a billion people -- is investigating one of its citizens for monopolistic practices.
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It's not irony. "There is only one lord, only one who can bend it to his will. And he does not share power."
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Oh the irony of China -- a country with a monopoly on power over more than a billion people -- is investigating one of its citizens for monopolistic practices.
No report on the mod points? Wondering why you are showing a low score of 1. So I'll quote it for visibility on the theory you got censor modded...
Not that I see justification for a positive moderation. Every government has or wants a "monopoly on power" over its own citizens. It actually is possible that the commies have become better capitalists than the Americans and actually understand why business monopolies are bad. I don't know if they care about the loss of choice and freedom part of it, but monopol
Monopoly??? (Score:5, Insightful)
Ah, yes. A monopoly probe by the Communist Party of China which holds... umm... a monopoly on power there.
And it has abused its monopoly to commit genocide against Uighurs, ethnically cleanse Tibet, and on a much smaller scale, kidnap and hold hostage a couple of Canadians for geopolitical purposes. Gee, better crack down on those monopolies.
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Yes, well, if you think that others necessarily think as do you, then you would say something like that.
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The US has been (overtly or covertly) supporting Tibetan independence groups since the 1950s, dumbass, and word of the Uighur genocide came out only relatively recently.
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I'm not American, so I'm not cheering for the USA. It's objectively true, however, that the Chinese Communist Party is one of the worst violators of human rights in the world today.
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The 50 cent army. The CCP and Xi Jinping is the greatest threat to free speech and democracy in the world today. That is absolutely clear after the annexation of Hong Kong. But keep defending China anyhow. Keep those 50 cent checks from Beijing rolling in.
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Quiet, CCP troll.
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If you think the 1.4 billion people in China does not include a large number of proud patriotic Chinese citizens you are very much mistaken. I am not defending China or Xi Jinping (the greatest threat to freedom and democracy in the world right now). But you are underestimating the strength of his hold on power. And geopolitically, unfortunately, it is not so easy to isolate China because it is an economically important country. The world still needs what China produces, and some countries actually export a
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I'm sure there are a lot of Chinese people who support the CCP and who are nationalistic. When what you see is tightly controlled, you start believing it.
And yes, for individual countries to squeeze China is incredibly difficult. That's why we need a broad coalition of liberal democracies to put pressure on China, both diplomatic and economic. I also think that liberal democracies should recognize Taiwan as an independent country and if China doesn't like it, too bad.
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I agree with you 100% on all points.
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I'm not American and I don't live in the United States. Try again, CCP troll.
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Alibaba Smart to IPO in U.S. (Score:5, Insightful)
China has been making so many mistakes on so many fronts, at an increasing pace. They've attacked every neighboring county, most literally and others diplomatically or economically. They are cracking down increasingly on freedoms and increasing surveillance... They have interned vast numbers of Uigers in camps that look increasingly like death camps with large crematoriums, continue to disappear large numbers of Tibetans and disloyal citizens elsewhere on a regular basis and have a firm grip on Hong Kong where they are now increasingly doing the same.
They are very aggressively attacking fishing boats and others of other nationalities in the South China sea while launching the world largest fishing fleets illegally fishing in other countries exclusive zones all over the world -- also often showing aggressiveness. The Chinese fisherman are now infamous for attacking others with iron pipes.
And yet the expansive claims continue as they want even a Russian port city, have taken all of the former no-man's land between India and China in the Himalayas and periodically lethally attack Indian outposts, while building up forces substantially nearby.
The Chinese military seems drunk on power now that China has the world's largest navy and anti-ship ballistic, hypersonic, and cruise missiles with substantially greater range than those of the United States.
Yet, China's industries are suffering the the Trade war with the United States, the reduction of types of business allowed to be conducted in various other world powers due to aggressive spying and other malicious activities, and now massive power blackouts due to its blockage of coal imports from Australia. China's projects to build roads and rails across Asia for trade are also failing as governments in those routes are increasingly shunning China.
China is destroying its future.
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Horrible government (Score:2)
Man, it must suck to live in a country where the government starts up antitrust proceedings because you're getting uppity against those in power, or failing to help them enough.
Now can this site get back to discussing the glories of changing section 230 because facebook and twitter aren't censoring politicical harrassment and misinformation to the politicians' content?
You're too important, Comrade Ma (Score:2)
Comrade Ma, your massive company is too important to China, therefore we need more control over it, therefore we'll find some way to prosecute you and just take you company from you -- because we're the Chinese Communist Party and we can do whatever we want.
Probably threaten his family and friends if he doesn't cooperate.
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Only an authoritarian state can rein in megacorps. (Score:2, Insightful)
If the competition annoys it.
I don't see a problem. Corporations are not people and should not be free to act as such. When freed to do so under kleptocracies like the US they instantly become toxic. Even when started with (theoretical) good intent they become Google.
It may be conventional legal structures as they inevitably evolve in the Western climate of impotent governments and dimwit citizens are inherently too weak to control megabusiness but the Chinese model routes around their lawyers and much of t
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Yeah but in China, large corporations are allowed IF THEY TOE THE PARTY LINE. This is just a warning / punishment to Jack Ma for purposes of emphasizing the ability of central power and authority to reign in ANYONE in China (PRC).
Consolidation of Power (Score:2, Insightful)
This is nothing to do with monopoly and everything to do with consolidation of power in the person of Xi Jinping and the CCP.
Over the last several years Beijing has dropped all pretense of being a good faith actor on the international scene and has allowed the whole world to see its more aggressive, authoritarian intentions. This monopoly investigation is simply putting Jack Ma and other business leaders on notice that the CCP can and will take away everything they have if they do not subordinate themselves
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Are you the 50 cent army? Can you still cash the checks from the CCP if you post anonymously?