This story is part of Forbes’ most abundant 2025 report on Hong Kong. See the full list here.

As an avid basketball fan, it seems that it has paid off for Alibaba co-founder and chairman Joseph Tsai, which contributed $2.3 billion to his wealth. Tsai, who owns the NBA team Brooklyn Nets, sold it to American billionaire Julia Koch for $688 million in Nets parent company BSE Global last June.

The deal values ​​BSE, which also has the right to operate the Barclays Center in the Stadium, with the New York Barclays Center and the women's basketball team of $4.6 billion. (Forbes ranked the network as the eighth valuable NBA franchise in 2024, with a value of $4.8 billion, 25% from the previous year, about twice the amount Tsai paid.

Meanwhile, Alibaba's stock rose more than 40% from the same period last year, benefiting from a new version of AI Model Qwen in January. Revenue rose 5% to $68 billion in the six months ended September 2024, while net profit rose 13% as investments collected offset losses from its overseas e-commerce division.