Jack Ma’s Ant Group Could Make the Largest IPO Debut in Recent Times with $200Bn Valuation

Jack Ma’s Ant Group is going public in two destinations. Based in Hangzhou, China, the company which is the parent of Alipay will be pursuing a dual-listing in Hong Kong and on the Shanghai stock exchange’s STAR board.

For Ant Group’s impending debut, the firm is pursuing a valuation of up to $200 billion, Bloomberg reports, which could possibly help it raise more in its IPO than Saudi Aramco’s $29 billion and make it the largest debut in recent years.

Ant Group’s Alipay

Ant Group operates Alipay, which was established by Jack Ma and Alibaba Group. In 2010, Alipay was severed from the Alibaba Group and then expanded into loans, wealth management and consumer credit under Ant Group.

Alipay is the world’s most widely used mobile payment platform. In 2013, the platform overtook Paypal, growing to over 870 million users as of March 31, 2018. According to information on the internet finance giant’s site, it currently has over 1 billion users.

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After the fourth quarter of 2018, Alipay has a 55.32% share of the third-party payment market in mainland China. Its 2019 Q4 market data report by iResearch showed that it has 55.1% of the market share while Tencent holdings has 38.9%.

In the Q4 of 2019, Ant Group generated about $721 billion for Alibaba Group as a dividend for 33% equity purchased in 2019. This means that Ant Group made approximately $2 billion in earnings. The company was valued at about $150 billion.

Fintech services operated by Ant group include Alipay, Koubei, Huabei, Mybank, and Ant Fortune.

Keeping its fingers Crossed

Despite having abundant capital and shooting for a valuation close to $200 billion, the group is still unsure of what the reception will be like in the stock market.

“Despite abundant capital, it is not sure how investors would view Ant Group since there are a lot of tech stocks in the market”

Pamela Chung, a Hong Kong-based managing director and head of IPO at consultancy Tricor Group.

Ant is diversifying from its core fintech services into customer and technology services which include artificial intelligence, blockchain, cloud computing and risk control.

As part of its strategy to hedge back competitors like Tencent, it plans to partner with brands like KFC Holding Co. and Marriott International Inc. to attract and manage customers.