Jack Zhang, the co-founder and chief executive of Australian-born payments company Airwallex, once claimed to have worked 100 hours a week for the past 20 years.
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Zhang → bear → years
These days, some of that time appears to be dedicated to playing keyboard warrior, with Zhang embroiled in increasingly intemperate online sparring over the company’s links to China.
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Zhang → appear → China
The source of Zhang’s online animus is Keith Rabois, the Trump-aligned Silicon Valley venture capitalist who has repeatedly accused Airwallex of being vulnerable to legal obligations to assist with Chinese Communist Party espionage upon request, on the basis that it could be compelled to hand American users’ data to Beijing.
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it → align → Beijing
This week, Zhang accused Rabois (who is on the board of rival payments start-up Ramp) of “unhinged conspiratorial rants” on X.
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who → accuse → rants
Rabois rather ominously warned that Zhang would be “pleading the fifth soon”, in a reference to the constitutional provision that protects people from self-incrimination.
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that → warn → incrimination
The Airwallex boss then responded with a Mad Men meme.
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boss → respond → meme
But Rabois’ claims clearly continue to get under Airwallex’s skin.
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claims → continue → skin
Airwallex, which was founded 11 years ago in a Melbourne cafe, but is now domiciled in the Cayman Islands, has been a runaway Australian fintech success story, most recently soaring to a $16 billion valuation and becoming the country’s second-most valuable start-up after Canva.
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which → found → Canva
But it has never quite been able to run away from a series of damaging headlines.
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it → run → headlines
Local outlets, including this masthead, have reported on a relentless, aggressive workplace culture at the company.
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outlets → include → company
Airwallex has attempted to shrug this off as the teething problems associated with a high-growth start-up, and the disconnect between its founders, a bunch of ambitious type A strivers like Zhang (who insists that burnout is not in his vocabulary), and less motivated staff.
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burnout → attempt → vocabulary
But the past 12 months have brought more serious allegations.
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months → bring → allegations
In January, weeks after Rabois made his claims about Chinese espionage, the financial crimes regulator AUSTRAC ordered an external audit of Airwallex’s anti-money-laundering and counter-terrorism-financing program, at the company’s expense, putting plans for a 2026 NASDAQ listing on ice.
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regulator → make → ice
In the US, Rabois’ concerns about China have also made it all the way to Capitol Hill, where a Republican-controlled congressional committee warned Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent that the company’s links to China could compromise sensitive American data.
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links → make → data
In June, Republican senator Tom Cotton said that while Airwallex “markets itself as an Australian company, its ties to communist China run deep”.
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ties → say → China
Zhang responded by framing these criticisms as blinded by bias against his own country of origin.
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Zhang → respond → origin
“I was born in China.
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I → bear → China
I cannot change that fact, nor would I seek to,” he wrote in a recent letter to the congressional committee.
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he → change → committee
I arrived in Melbourne as an immigrant at 15 with little English and no safety net, and Australia gave me the education, the opportunity and the freedom to build something.
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Australia → arrive → something
Through all this, however, the company has at times come across as impossibly thin-skinned.
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company → come → times
In January this year, it threatened litigation against media outlets including this masthead if they refused to remove critical articles about the company that quoted leaked internal documents, including some concerning its work culture.
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that → threaten → culture
This masthead also revealed that it was seeking to hire influencers to praise Zhang’s “thought leadership”.
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it → reveal → leadership
Since then, Airwallex has embarked on a less clunky image-laundering blitz.
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Airwallex → embark → blitz
Former federal treasurer Josh Frydenberg was drafted onto its newly formed economic advisory council along with ex-US senator Roy Blunt in May.
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Frydenberg → draft → May
Last year, the company forged a partnership with English Premier League football champions Arsenal, and in July, revealed an advertisement directed by Spike Lee and featuring club legend Thierry Henry.
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company → forge → Henry
Airwallex is plotting a major expansion into the United States and has beefed up its lobbying muscle there.
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Airwallex → plot → muscle
Rachael Horwitz, a Silicon Valley veteran, with senior positions and Google, Meta and Andreessen Horowitz, was drafted in as senior vice president global communications and corporate affairs.
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Horwitz → draft → president
Samantha Vinograd, a former Biden administration counter-terrorism advisor and national security pundit on CBS, has started running corporate affairs.
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Vinograd → start → affairs
Meanwhile, according to the Financial Times, it has been moving staff who do not work in China-facing roles out of that country in response to those security concerns.
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who → accord → concerns
While these fears might have delayed a planned IPO until next year, they have not stopped the company from continuing to secure more funding from investors who believe in its product, sending its valuation ever higher.
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who → delay → valuation
Despite that valuation, and all its on-paper success, Airwallex remains acutely sensitive to criticism of its operations in China.
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Airwallex → remain → China
Jack Zhang is no Don Draper, and he clearly thinks about Keith Rabois quite a bit.
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he → think → Rabois
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newsletter → deliver → stories
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