Chinese billionaire Jack Ma arrives in Kathmandu

Chinese billionaire Jack Ma arrived in Nepal's capital Kathmandu on Tuesday afternoon, confirmed officials.

The co-founder of the Chinese online trade platform, Alibaba, landed at Tribhuwan International Airport at around 2 pm (local time) today in his private Boeing 747 Max aircraft.

"He landed in Kathmandu today in his private plane. He said that he flew from China to Nepal in the immigration form," Chief of Nepal's Immigration Department Jhalakram Adhikari told ANI over phone.

The Chinese billionaire who arrived with a seven-member team is staying at a hotel in Kathmandu.

According to Adhikari, the Director General of the Department of Immigration, Jack Ma has been granted 15 days tourist visa and is scheduled to call on Nepal Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal.

No official announcement has been made about the Chinese entrepreneur's arrival in Kathmandu and he hasn't demanded any security during his stay in the country. The reasons for his visit to Nepal also haven't been made public.

Earlier this March, the Chinese magnate returned to mainland China after spending roughly a year overseas, according to people familiar with the matter as cited in The Wall Street Journal.

Jack Ma, who spent the majority of the previous year in Japan, made a trip back to China, according to the sources quoted by WSJ. He had also visited Singapore and Australia and spent the most recent Lunar New Year in Hong Kong.

According to a report in the Voice of America (VOA), after returning to China, Jack Ma visited the Yungu School, a private academy in Hangzhou funded by his Alibaba Group, which includes one of the world's biggest online commerce companies.

At the school, he talked about "the future of education with the campus directors" and "the challenges and opportunities" that "new technological change brings to education," according to the school's WeChat account, the VOA report said.

Jack Ma has maintained a low profile after Ant Group Co. cancelled initial public offerings in Hong Kong and Shanghai that were expected to raise more than USD 34 billion in November 2020, according to Wall Street Journal.

The cancellations took place as authorities were angered over Jack Ma's remarks at a financial forum. Authorities then opened an investigation against Alibaba for allegedly engaging in anticompetitive activities on its e-commerce platform, and the company was ultimately slammed with a record-breaking USD 2.8 billion fine, the WSJ reported.

Soon after, China began a broad regulatory crackdown on other private companies, increasing regulations on everything from video games and education to real estate.

Jack Ma relinquished leadership of Ant Group in January this year after the company's shareholders approved a restructuring of business. The crackdown on the fintech operations of more than a dozen internet companies was "basically" over, according to the party chief at China's central bank, who made the statement on the same day, the WSJ report said.

The American daily said that Jack Ma mostly disappeared from public view since giving a speech that criticised regulators on the eve of the cancelled Ant listing in 2020.