Alibaba’s high-profile founder Jack Ma has been lying low and spending time on hobbies and charity work, a top executive says as the company waits out a regulatory storm over its business practices.

Joseph Tsai, the company’s co-founder and executive vice chair, told CNBC during an interview that he would chat with Ma every day.

“He’s actually doing very, very well. He’s taken up painting as a hobby, and this is actually not bad,” said Tsai, who was often dubbed “the man behind Jack Ma.”

“He is like you and me, a normal person.”

Ma receded from the limelight after Chinese authorities took umbrage at his comments in October last year about the dated regulatory system in the country.

The Alibaba Group was placed under intense scrutiny and had to put the brakes on a much-touted dual debut of its affiliate, the Ant Group, on the Hong Kong and Shanghai stock markets.

Ma made a public appearance in January when he attended an online ceremony to praise 100 rural teachers. Regulators in April fined Alibaba a record 18.2 billion yuan (US$2.8 billion) for antitrust business practices.

Tsai said that what happened to Ma and to the company should be viewed separately. The company was restructuring itself in terms of financial and anticompetitive practices, he said.

“We have paid a huge fine. But we have put that behind us, so now we’re going forward,” Tsai told CNBC.

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