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Web firm Alibaba set to top Facebook in market debut(Guardian (UK) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Chinese internet company Alibaba is seeking to raise more than $21bn (pounds 13bn) in an initial public offering that will value it at up to $163bn and rank it as the largest-ever technology debut in the US. Alibaba expects to set a price of between $60 and $66 per share, valuing the company at about $163bn at the top end of the range and raising a maximum of $21.1bn. The details, from an amended prospectus, would make Alibaba almost as valuable as Amazon and set the company on a course to top the last record share sale, Facebook's 2012 IPO. The e-commerce company will begin a road show in New York next week to meet investors expected in advance of a sale later this month. It plans to list under the symbol BABA on the New York stock exchange. The share sale will create a new set of tech billionaires. The company, based in the eastern Chinese city of Hangzhou, was founded in 1999 by current executive chairman Jack Ma. At $66 a share, Ma would make $840m before taxes by selling 12.75 million shares. His remaining holding in Alibaba of about 193 million shares would be worth $12.76bn. Joseph Tsai, vice-chairman, stands to make $280m before taxes by selling 4.25 million shares. He would retain a 3.2% stake worth more than $5.2bn at $66 per share. The sale will also be a huge payday for Yahoo, one of Alibaba's largest shareholders. Yahoo is planning to cut its stake in the firm from 22.4% to 16.3%. The share sale has attracted enormous attention on Wall Street because of the company's preeminent position in the fast growing Chinese market. "When an Internet company of our scale that originated from China enters the global scene, you should expect that it will encounter scepticism from different directions due to differences in cultural perspectives, values and even geopolitical positioning," Ma said in a letter to investors reminiscent of the "founder's letters" that accompanied the debuts of Facebook and Google. "While it may be difficult for a public Alibaba to sidestep controversy, we hope that controversies generate constructive debate and add fresh perspectives to the dialogue on globalisation." Retail e-commerce sales in China were $132.6m in 2013, according to eMarketer, and that figure is expected to rise another 63.9% in 2014 to reach $217.4bn. By 2017, eMarketer estimates, China will surpass the US as the largest retail e-commerce market in the world. Alibaba operates the Taobao and Tmall online marketplaces, which have hundreds of millions of users in China. Transactions at the two marketplaces topped $248bn last year, greater than comparable figures for Amazon and eBay combined. The company generated about $395m in mobile revenue in the latest quarter, up tenfold from a year earlier. However there have been complaints about the complexity of the firm's accounting. Alibaba chose to debut on Wall Street after it could not get the Hong Kong exchange to agree a rule change that would allow it to nominate the majority of its own board even after the share sale. Caption: $60 Likely minimum price of Alibaba shares when they launch on the New York stock exchange, valuing it at about $162.7bn (c) 2014 Guardian Newspapers Limited. |