Friday, April 25, 2014

Philanthropy in China: Giving in | The Economist

Philanthropy in China: Giving in | The Economist: Despite making vast fortunes in a country suffering from widening income inequality, surprisingly few Chinese fat cats have embraced charitable giving.

That may be about to change. Jack Ma (pictured above), the founder of Alibaba, a Chinese e-commerce giant, and Joseph Tsai, a co-founder, announced on April 24th that they have set up charities to be funded by stock options in the firm. This matters not only because Mr Ma is a widely admired entrepreneur. His firm is also about to go public in America, with analysts speculating it may be worth over $100 billion. It is thought that the options to be handed over to the new charities could be worth several billion dollars.

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