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Alibaba founder Jack Ma, – By Nicholas Yong BBC News, Singapore

Alibaba founder Jack Ma, who has rarely been seen in public in the past three years, has resurfaced at a school in Hangzhou, a report says.

The 58-year-old has kept a low profile since criticising China’s financial regulators in 2020.

Mr Ma was the most high-profile Chinese billionaire to have disappeared amid a crackdown on tech entrepreneurs.

He recently returned to China after more than a year overseas, according to the South China Morning Post.

The Alibaba-owned newspaper said he had made a short stopover in Hong Kong, where he met friends and also briefly visited Art Basel, an international art fair.

It added that Mr Ma has been travelling to different countries to learn about agricultural technology, but made no reference as to why he had disappeared from public view in recent years.

Mr Ma, a former English teacher, met staff and toured classrooms at the Yungu School in Hangzhou, the city in which Alibaba is headquartered.

He talked about the potential challenges of artificial intelligence to education, according to the school’s social media page.

“ChatGPT and similar technologies are just the beginning of the AI era. We should use artificial intelligence to solve problems instead of being controlled by it,” he said.

Once the richest man in China, Mr Ma gave up control of financial technology giant Ant Group in January this year.

It was seen by some commentators as further evidence that he had fallen foul of the Chinese Communist Party for becoming outspoken and too powerful.

In October 2020, Mr Ma told a financial conference that traditional banks had a “pawn-shop mentality”.

The following month, Ant’s planned £26bn stock market flotation, which would have been the world’s largest, was cancelled at the last minute by Chinese authorities, who cited “major issues” over regulating the firm.

Since then, there have been reported sightings of him in various countries including Spain, the Netherlands, Thailand and Australia.

Last November, the Financial Times newspaper reported that Mr Ma had been living in Tokyo, Japan for six months.

When Mr Ma first stopped making public appearances, it was rumoured that he had been placed under house arrest or had been otherwise detained.

Elon Musk: Twitter says parts of source code leaked online

According to Peter Hoskins, a business reporter, social media platform owned by billionaire Elon Musk has experienced a security breach as parts of its source code were leaked online. Twitter has reported that the code was shared on GitHub, a service owned by Microsoft where software developers can share code.

The leaked code has since been removed following Twitter’s request. Additionally, Mr Musk has allegedly signaled to Twitter employees that the company is now valued at less than half of the $44bn (£36bn) he paid for it last year. Mr Musk has been facing challenges in his role as CEO of Twitter, including a decrease in the company’s workforce by over a third, an exodus of advertisers, and now, the code leak. It has been reported that he has offered stock grants to staff to raise the company’s value. The Twitter press office did not respond to a request for comment, and instead, sent a poo emoji, which Mr Musk had previously announced in a tweet as the company’s response.

Silicon Valley Bank: Collapsed US lender bought by rival

Rival First Citizens BancShares is purchasing the assets and loans of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), which has collapsed in the US. This deal has been well-received by investors, with the shares of First Citizens rising by more than 40%. Banking shares have also seen wider gains following SVB’s failure, which raised concerns about the stability of the sector. Credit Suisse, the Swiss banking giant, has been experiencing issues, leading to a hurried takeover by UBS.

The deal between First Citizens and SVB concludes a saga that began earlier this month after a run on the bank forced US regulators to take over. All 17 former SVB branches will open under the First Citizens brand on Monday, following which SVB customers will be notified that their accounts have been fully transferred. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp has revealed that First Citizens has purchased around $72bn of SVB’s assets at a discount of $16.5bn. The FDIC will retain control of about $90bn of SVB’s assets and estimates the cost of the SVB failure to its deposit insurance fund will be about $20bn.

It will also receive an equity stake in First Citizens worth up to $500m. The FDIC received 27 bids from 18 bidders before choosing the First Citizens deal. HSBC purchased the UK arm of SVB earlier this month for £1. Rising interest rates have contributed to bank failures in the US, hitting the value of investments that banks keep some of their money in.

Central banks have stated that the banking system is safe and lenders are well-capitalised, but there is concern in financial markets that other issues in the banking sector have not yet emerged. The International Monetary Fund has warned of the increased risks to financial stability, particularly given the higher debt levels and rapid transition from a prolonged period of low interest rates to much higher rates.