Alibaba’s bond sale attracts US$38 billion worth of orders as investors shrug off antitrust fears and look to future of China’s booming e-commerce industry

An avalanche of orders from a veritable Who’s Who of investors allowed the e-commerce giant to price its debt tighter than initial guidance

The bond sale comes after Alibaba reported a 37 per cent surge in revenue for the quarter ended December

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The wait for Alibaba to come back to markets created pent up demand among investors, according to people familiar with the deal. Photo: Bloomberg

Published: 2:38pm, 5 Feb 2021Updated: 9:53am, 7 Feb 2021

Alibaba Group Holding’s US$5 billion bond attracted an avalanche of orders from fixed-income investors, peaking at US$38 billion, on growing confidence that the e-commerce behemoth will emerge relatively unscathed from an antitrust investigation.

The scramble to buy the bonds allowed the platform company to sell its new dollar-denominated debt at a more advantageous price than initially expected, according to people familiar with the transaction.

The vote of confidence in Alibaba’s long-term future comes after its founder Jack Ma was summoned by China’s regulators for a dressing down in November and Beijing shelved an initial public offering by its financial affiliate Ant Group at the last minute. China’s antitrust watchdog started investigating the firm’s business practices on December 24.

“I’ve long been declaring that the regulatory threat is overblown, so I was supportive of the new dollar bonds,” said Brock Silvers, chief investment officer at Hong Kong-based investment firm Kaiyuan Capital.