Alibaba’s order books for its US$13.4-billion Hong Kong share sale have already been covered “multiple times,” sources with direct knowledge of the matter said on Friday, as the e-commerce group kicked off its campaign for the secondary listing in the city gripped by protests.
The Chinese online retail giant plans to list its shares in Hong Kong from Nov. 26 and is marketing the deal to investors around the world. Alibaba anticipates raising up to US$13.4-billion from retail and institutional investors in the offering.
The sources said potential investors had been told that the “quality of demand is high” and that there “continues to be very strong feedback” about the deal.
An Alibaba spokeswoman declined to comment.
Pricing of the shares for institutional shareholders will be set on Nov. 20, a prospectus lodged with the Hong Kong Stock Exchange shows. Retail investors will not pay more than 188 Hong Kong dollars (about US$24) per share.
In a first for the Asian financial hub, Alibaba said the listing would be fully automated and paperless to reflect its environmental standards, confirming an earlier Reuters story.
Investment bankers familiar with the listing however said the move avoided a potential publicity nightmare of investors queuing at banks to place stock orders while protests raged around them.
Four thousand people have been arrested in Hong Kong since June and the territory’s economy has sunk into recession for the first time in a decade as the anti-government demonstrations disrupt business and deter tourists.
Last week, Alibaba Group Chairman Daniel Zhang made no mention of the unrest in Hong Kong in a letter included in the company’s supplementary prospectus.
“Over the last few years, there have been many encouraging reforms in Hong Kong’s capital market. During this time of ongoing change, we continue to believe that the future of Hong Kong remains bright,” Mr. Zhang wrote. (The Globa and Mail)
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