“Some of the tech companies became larger than life,” said Allan Zeman, a property tycoon who gave up his Canadian passport to become a naturalized citizen of China in 2008. One big lesson from the crackdown: “Don’t get bigger than the government,” Zeman said, shortly after attending the Communist Party’s 100th anniversary celebration in Beijing on July 1.

Didi notwithstanding, the message appears to be getting through. Ma, who criticized Chinese financial regulators in his last public speech before Ant’s IPO was abruptly suspended, has since resurfaced only a handful of times in carefully choreographed appearances.

Colin Huang, whose e-commerce giant Pinduoduo Inc. has come under scrutiny for its relentless working schedules, has given up his roles as chairman and CEO and donated shares worth billions of dollars. ByteDance Ltd. founder Zhang Yiming said in May he would step down as CEO and spend more time on educational charity; the firm is approaching any potential IPO cautiously after meetings with government officials over data security issues earlier this year, people with knowledge of the matter said.

Wang Xing, the chairman of food-delivery giant Meituan, has mostly steered clear of the public spotlight since he posted a 1,100-year-old poem in May that some regarded as an implicit criticism of the government. Wang, who later issued a clarification saying the post had been targeted at the shortsightedness of his own industry, was advised by Beijing officials to keep a low profile, according to people with knowledge of the matter.

The new environment will “fundamentally change” China’s tech sector, partly because investors will become more wary of funding entrepreneurs who could end up on a collision course with Beijing, said Eric Schiffer, CEO of Patriarch Organization, a Los Angeles-based private equity firm.

U.S. President Joe Biden has also taken aim at the billionaire class, calling for increased taxes on the rich and signing an executive order on Friday that aims to weaken dominance of America’s biggest companies. The move echoed an ongoing antitrust campaign in China that has ensnared giants including Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. and arch-rival Tencent Holdings Ltd.

One key difference is that Chinese authorities, unrestrained by Western-style checks and balances, can act more forcefully than their U.S. counterparts, said Angela Zhang, director of the Centre for Chinese Law at the University of Hong Kong and author of “Chinese Antitrust Exceptionalism.” Zuckerberg’s hydrofoil joyride came just a few days after a judge dismissed two monopoly lawsuits against Facebook Inc. that had been filed by the U.S. government and a coalition of states.

“In the case of China, the pendulum swings very quickly,” Zhang said.

Beijing has a variety of tools for reining in billionaires, including detention in the most extreme cases. An internal disciplinary process for party members, known as shuanggui, has been used for some tycoons in the past. Investigations by antitrust, cybersecurity and other regulators are more common ways to influence the behavior of tech giants. The government also uses “soft” methods including state-media campaigns, Zhang said.

In the days after regulators halted Ant’s IPO, Xi visited a museum in the eastern city of Nantong that was created by Zhang Jian, a 19th century capitalist. The Chinese president described Zhang as a patriotic nation builder and philanthropist. Rather than disrupt the financial system with unregulated loans, he built factories and hundreds of schools.