PONY MA, chairman and CEO of Shenzhen-based Internet giant Tencent, has been named the most generous philanthropist of Chinese origin globally in a 2016 report by Hurun Research Institute.

    In April, Ma donated 100 million company shares to fund his personal charitable works, making it China’s second-biggest philanthropic donation in history. In 2014, Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. founder, Jack Ma, and co-founder, Joe Tsai, pledged share options worth about US$3 billion at the time to newly established charitable trusts.

    Pony Ma’s donated shares are estimated at 1.39 billion yuan (US$207.46 million). The funds will be used to support medical care, education, environment protection and research on cutting-edge technologies and basic science.

    Pony Ma currently has a net worth of 124 billion yuan, ranking 41 among Hu’s Global Rich List.

    Tencent co-founder Chen Yidan donated US$615 million to a private college, as well as to fund the Yidan Prize, an education award.

    Among the 51 philanthropists whose donations reached more than 500 million yuan, half of them engage in property development and 16 of them were businesspeople in Guangdong Province.

    Hurun’s list included a total of 122 ethnic Chinese philanthropists, including 13 from Hong Kong and five from Taiwan.

    In total, the philanthropists have donated 35.2 billion yuan. Donations were defined as cash or cash equivalents pledged through legally binding commitments from April 2015 to March 2016.

    The average age of the top 100 Chinese mainland philanthropists was 55, 21 years younger than those outside the Chinese mainland. China’s generous entrepreneurs also included Hong Kong casino mogul Lui Che Woo, Foxconn’s Terry Guo and property tycoon Wang Jianlin.

    Sharp-Roxy chairman Li Dak-sum, real estate developer Xu Jiayin, China Oceanwide Group chairman Lu Zhiqiang, and Fujian-based billionaire Huang Rulun also made the list.

    (Han Ximin)