The backlash against Big Tech gathers pace

China's regulators have proposed new anti-monopoly guidelines that could hit tech giants Alibaba and Tencent. Could the US be next to join in?

US Capitol building
A gridlocked Congress may be unable to agree antitrust measures against Big Tech
(Image credit: © Getty Images/iStockphoto)

The Big Tech backlash has come to China, says Jacky Wong in The Wall Street Journal. Regulators recently suspended Ant Group’s $37bn stockmarket flotation at short notice. Now they have proposed new anti-monopoly guidelines that could hit Alibaba and Tencent, the internet giants whose social-media apps and payment and e-commerce platforms dominate daily life in China.

The news rocked Chinese tech shares, says Megha Bahree on Al Jazeera. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Technology index retreated by 11% over two days last week. China has previously taken a largely “hands-off” approach towards its domestic tech titans, but Covid-19 has made the issue of market concentration unavoidable. E-commerce accounted for roughly one-quarter of sales in China last year, but that figure is “edging towards 30%” due to the pandemic.

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Markets editor

Alex is an investment writer who has been contributing to MoneyWeek since 2015. He has been the magazine’s markets editor since 2019. 

Alex has a passion for demystifying the often arcane world of finance for a general readership. While financial media tends to focus compulsively on the latest trend, the best opportunities can lie forgotten elsewhere. 

He is especially interested in European equities – where his fluent French helps him to cover the continent’s largest bourse – and emerging markets, where his experience living in Beijing, and conversational Chinese, prove useful. 

Hailing from Leeds, he studied Philosophy, Politics and Economics at the University of Oxford. He also holds a Master of Public Health from the University of Manchester.