China has postponed the biggest share sale in history and called in the country's richest man, Jack Ma, for a dressing-down by financial regulators in a shock move investors believe is retribution for the entrepreneur's criticism of the state-owned banking system.

China halted the $US37 billion ($52 billion) dual-listing of Ant Group, a spin-off of Mr Ma's Alibaba Group, just two days before its scheduled debut on stock exchanges in Shanghai and Hong Kong. The heavily oversubscribed initial public offering would have been the biggest in history.