- AFP
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Chinese online retail titan Alibaba is
hoping to raise up to 15 billion dollars in a Hong Kong IPO, a report said Friday,
which would be the city’s biggest listing for nine years.
The share sale by Asia’s biggest company would also come as Hong Kong
authorities battle months of sometimes violent protests that have dented the
financial hub’s economy and reputation.
Alibaba is looking to scoop up between 10 billion and 15 billion dollars in the
initial public offering, Bloomberg News cited unnamed sources as saying, and
is looking to hold a hearing into the move — as mandated by the Hong Kong
exchange rules — next week.
The firm declined to comment on the report when contacted by AFP.
Alibaba, which is already listed on New York’s Nasdaq, had planned to list
in the summer but called it off owing to the city’s long-running pro-democracy
demonstrations and the China-US trade war.
If realised, the 15 billion dollars IPO would be the biggest since insurance giant
AIA garnered 20.5 billion dollars in 2010. However, it is lower than the 20 billion dollars
it had aimed to raise initially.
A second listing in Hong Kong would also curry favour with Beijing, which
has sought to encourage its current and future big tech firms to list nearer
to home after the loss of companies such as Alibaba and Baidu to Wall Street.
Mainland authorities have stepped up moves to attract such firms including
launching a new technology board in Shanghai in July.
The Sci-Tech Innovation Board was launched as a battle with the United
States for technological supremacy heated up, with Chinese President Xi
Jinping calling on tech leaders to become global champions, while the US has
fought back in part by taking steps to clip the wings of Chinese telecom giant
Huawei.
Alibaba has capitalised on the Chinese consumer’s love of e-commerce to
dominate the sector in China and become one of the world’s most valuable
companies.(AFP)
