Alibaba Hong Kong share issue sees huge investor interest

Alibaba Group Holding Ltd said its Hong Kong share issue was oversubscribed multiple times thanks to massive investor interest, ahead of its listing in what could be the world's largest initial public offering in 2019 so far on Tuesday.

In a statement to the Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Ltd on Monday, the e-commerce giant said a total of 215,598 valid applications have been received pursuant to the Hong Kong public offering for roughly 530 million Hong Kong offer shares.

This translates into"42.44 times of the total number of 12.5 million Hong Kong offer shares initially available for subscription", it said.

As the over-subscription represents 20 times or more of the total number of offer shares initially available under the Hong Kong public offering, the reallocation procedure in the prospectus has been applied and 37.5 million offer shares have been reallocated from the international offering to the Hong Kong public offering, it noted.

The company added that the final number of offer shares for retail investors under the Hong Kong listing has been increased to 50 million, representing 10 percent of the total number of offer shares initially available under the global offering, and they are being allocated to 195,710 successful applicants.

Separately, the Hong Kong bourse said it would roll out options and futures contracts for the stock when Alibaba makes its trading debut on Tuesday. The shares can also be available for short-selling.

Alibaba will trade under stock code number 9988, in lots of 100 shares. On the same day, the HKEX will roll out Alibaba options at 500 shares per lot, with maturities ranging from one to 10 months. The futures contracts will be offered at durations of one to seven months, it said.

The listing in Hong Kong could give people in the Chinese mainland the possibility to invest directly in Alibaba shares due to the Hong Kong-Shanghai Stock Connect, an investment channel that connects the Hong Kong and Shanghai bourses, said Dickie Wong, head of research at Kingston Securities.

"An IPO in Hong Kong would also provide a diversification of funding for Alibaba in terms of geography and types of investors and a buffer to the shares listed on the New York Stock Exchange in case of global turmoil due to Sino-US trade friction," wrote Matteo Giovannini, a finance professional at Industrial and Commercial Bank of China in Beijing and a member of the China Task Force at the Italian Ministry of Economic Development, in a latest opinion piece published on the website of China Global Television Network.

Alibaba, which raised $25 billion in the world's biggest initial public offering when it listed in New York five years ago, was riding on a positive momentum after it raked in a record $38 billion on Nov 11, its annual shopping extravaganza.