The View | Jack Ma’s Alibaba haunted by mess over Alipay

Every successful and revolutionary technology company benefits from a big break that vaults them over competitors. Alibaba’s 11-11 promotion is an impressive event that crowns its prowess in China’s consumer market.

But, to understand the e-commerce giant that Alibaba has become today requires an understanding of its secret history that makes so many business people still suspicious of Jack Ma.

His big break came in 2011 when he wrenched control of Alipay away from Alibaba at a time when Yahoo! and Softbank were major shareholders of the company. The transaction remains an enduring mystery in the history of the company.

In the minds of investors, the entire incident continues to haunt the reputation of Jack Ma because he has not fully explained it. Alibaba’s executives direct attention to its disclosure in its listing prospectus and focus on current news.

Other apologists shockingly spin the entire incident as a cultural misunderstanding. Then, lawyers will privately describe it as an outright theft or one of the strangest, if not outlandish corporate governance failures in history.

It is incredulous that a major corporation like Yahoo! with an army of in house lawyers could lose control of Alipay without prior knowledge; it is like having your home disappear from in front of your eyes. It is an example of the brazen deprecations and mistreatment that foreign investors can suffer in China. Now here is where the facts contradict each other so much that they become outright strange. Alibaba denied any malfeasance and says the transfer was duly discussed and approved despite Yahoo!’s explanation.