The family of Chinese billionaire Jack Ma bought a £19.5 million London mansion amid a rapprochement with Chinese authorities after years of scrutiny and political exile.
Ma’s wife, Cathy Ying Zhang, acquired the six-bedroom Edwardian house, formerly the Italian embassy, in London’s elite Belgravia district in October 2024, property records show.
The purchase came after Ma’s return to public life after disappearing from view in the aftermath of a speech criticising China’s financial system. It could be seen as a “precautionary diversification” in case Ma again provokes Beijing’s ire, said Sari Arho Havrén, a China specialist at the Royal United Services Institute.
“Wealthy families are hedging against regime risk—one never knows when policies may turn hostile again,” she said. “Affluent families are diversifying quietly. Rule of law societies still hold considerable appeal.”
Ma, 61, is the founder of Alibaba Group, whose online commerce platforms have earned him a fortune of around $30 billion. The Belgravia house, the Ma family’s first known property holding in the UK, may have been funded by the sale of Alibaba shares in 2023, Havrén said.
Ma’s wife Zhang, who has taken Singaporean citizenship, is reportedly the sole director of an offshore company that Ma used to buy a château and vineyards in France.
Last year it was reported that Zhang spent up to $38 million on three commercial properties in Singapore. The buying spree is part of a trend that has seen prominent Chinese businesspeople move money abroad for fear of asset freezes or capital controls.
Many have left China altogether. As many as 13,800 “high-net-worth individuals” emigrated in 2024—a 28 percent rise from 2022, according to investment migration consultants Henley & Partners.
The sale of the Belgravia mansion, managed by Knight Frank and Beauchamp Estates and handled by law firm Withers LLP, was rushed through ahead of a rise in the UK’s stamp duty surcharge for overseas buyers, according to a November 2024 report that did not name the buyer.
Beauchamp and Knight Frank declined to comment. Zhang and Ma Withers did not respond to questions put to them via Withers.
In 2015, it was reported that Ma family purchased ‘Asia’s most expensive home’ in Hong Kong’s Victoria Peak which was formerly owned by the Belgian government. In the same year, it was reported that Ma had bought a 28,000 acre property in upstate New York for $23 million.
Ma vanished from public view in late 2020 after he criticised China’s financial regulators. Beijing reportedly punished him with a fine of nearly $3 billion and halted a stock market listing by Ant Group, an offshoot of Alibaba.
He resurfaced in China in 2023 after an apparent reconciliation with the administration of President Xi Jinping, occasionally attending public events. In February 2025, he was seen shaking Xi’s hand at event with Chinese industry leaders. However, Ma’s public remarks went unreported by official state media, prompting analysts to suggest that he had not been “completely rehabilitated”.
In April, The Guardian reported that Chinese authorities enlisted Ma as part of a campaign to pressure a dissident businessman to return to China from France to help prosecute an official who had angered the regime.
“They said I’m the only one who can persuade you to return,” Ma reportedly told the unnamed businessman in a telephone call. The Chinese government called the allegations “pure fabrication”.
Headline picture: Beauchamp Estates