Alibaba.com Debuts in HK - Hong Kong
Chinese e-commerce portal Alibaba.com made a strong debut on the Hong Kong stock market Tuesday, with its shares soaring as much as 170 percent in the morning session.
Alibaba.com shares rose as high as 36.05 Hong Kong dollars (US$4.64; euro3.20) before finishing morning trade at HK$35.75. Based on current price, the company has a market cap of about $23 billion, about $9 billion more than chinese search engine leader Baidu!
Demand has been heavy for the business-to-business Web site, which raised US$1.5 billion through its global offering of 858.9 million shares, or a 17 percent stake of the company.
The morning low was HK$28, still about 185 times Alibaba.com’s projected 2008 earnings and much higher than the 83 times price-to-earnings multiple of Chinese-language Internet-search provider Baidu.com Inc.
Speaking in Taiwan on Monday, Jack Ma, Founder of Alibaba, said he wanted to turn the company into a “leading e-commerce platform for China, Asia, and even the world.”
We congratulate Jack Ma for his IPO success and will continue to provide support to the Alibaba community. See our earlier post about Alibaba.