Alibaba Group Debuts on Wall Street with World-Record $25 Billion IPO

Chinese e-commerce company stock opens at $92.70

Alibaba logo

Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba (BABA) began its historic New York Stock Exchange IPO just before noon on Friday, opening at a price of $92.70 per share.

That trading number summed to a world-record Initial Public Offering of $25 billion.

The stock quickly soared even higher, topping $97 per share just a few minutes after the highly anticipated open.

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Alibaba Group is based in Hangzhou, China. The company is essentially the Chinese eBay, though it quickly expanded into a global hub for consumer sales and online payments.

The company also owns a portfolio of U.S. investments, including online delivery service ShopRunner and ride-hailing app Lyft.

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The Alibaba open was actually delayed more than two hours due to order imbalances. Just before the stock finally opened, the latest indications forecasted $92-$93 per share, according to analysts on CNBC, an estimate which held.

American depositary shares of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. were priced at $68 last night, as Forbes reported.

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Visa had previously held the title of largest U.S. IPO at $17.9 billion.

The record for biggest worldwide IPO was previously held by Agricultural Bank of China, which raised $24.3 billion when it went public in Hong Kong in 2010.

 

 

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