Alibaba To Price IPO In The Range Of $60 To $66 A Share

(RTTNews) - Alibaba Group Holding Ltd in a regulatory filing Friday said it expects to set the price range of its initial public offering at $60 to $66 per American depositary share.

The Chinese e-commerce company expects to offer 320.1 million shares, and the underwriters would be granted the right to buy up an additional about 48 million additional shares.

The offering is expected to raise as much as $24 billion and would value the firm at $163 billion, but may exceed $250 billion once it starts trading.

The selling shareholders in the offering include Japanese telecommunications and Internet company SoftBank Corp (SFTBY, SFTBF), Yahoo (YHOO) and Alibaba founder and Chairman Jack Ma.

SoftBank is expected to cut its holdings in Ailbaba by 1.7 percent to 32.4 percent, while Yahoo is to reduce its stake by 10 percent from about 23 percent. Jack Ma will cut its stake to 7.8 percent from 8.8 percent.

Alibaba would not receive any proceeds from the offering.

Alibaba is expected to launch the offering this month and plans to list under the symbol "BABA" on the New York Stock Exchange.

Alibaba, which accounts for about 80 percent of all Chinese e-commerce, was co-founded in 1999 by former English teacher Jack Ma. The company has benefited from sustained economic growth in China and has developed an all-encompassing retail ecosystem that ranges from payment systems to cloud computing services.

Alibaba has a vibrant business structure. It operates China's largest online shopping destination, Taobao Marketplace; and third-party platform for brands and retailers, Tmall. It also operates Juhuasuan, a popular group buying marketplace in China.

Alibaba had reported a 46 percent growth in second-quarter revenues on a surge in its mobile business.