Taylor Swift’s fans in China are taking no risks in protecting themselves against heartbreak (and potentially scoring financially) should the pop-star split from new beau Tom Hiddleston. The Chinese online marketplace Taobao has banned insurance policies that are being issued in the event of a break-up.
The plan for the couple, named “Hiddleswift” in the press, included half of the money originally paid. The Xinhua News Agency reports that vendors on the site had been placing bets on the couple’s future, with the minimum wager reaching 1 yuan, equal to 15 cents U.S. dollars.
Xinhua also reported that one policy purchaser wrote, “If I bought a million, I would make a lot -- these stars break up all the time which gives us to opportunity to earn a lot of money!” A survey averaging Swift’s past relationships, including Joe Jonas, Jake Gyllenhaal, Harry Styles and a few others was on average two and a half months.
This past Wednesday (June 29) Taobao released a message blocking the insurance offerings that read, “According to laws and regulations, what you have searched for cannot be displayed.” There were additionally insurance offers betting on the fate of couple Katy Perry and Orlando Bloom, as well as whether Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton will end up being president. All insurance policy offerings on the site have now been removed.
The group behind Taobao, Alibaba, released a statement to The Hollywood Reporter that read, “As it is not strictly an insurance product, the sellers are not qualified as insurance sellers. So we have taken down such ‘products’ from the Taobao platform.”
Alibaba asserts that the insurance policies were largely being used to attract traffic to the website and served as a marketing tool.
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