Alibaba's largest shareholder has been replaced.
On January 24th, according to sources cited by the South China Morning Post, retired Alibaba founder Jack Ma purchased approximately $50 million in Alibaba stocks in the fourth quarter of last year, making him the largest single shareholder with a shareholding ratio exceeding the 4.3% reported at the end of 2021.
Interface News has sought confirmation from Alibaba regarding this matter, and the other party will not comment.
But yesterday, Alibaba officially confirmed the news that Jack Ma and Cai Chongxin have recently significantly increased their holdings in Alibaba stocks. A document on the website of the US Securities Regulatory Commission shows that Alibaba's current chairman, Tsai Chongxin, has increased his holdings of Alibaba stocks worth $150 million through his family fund Blue Pool. A series of actions may be in response to rumors of Jack Ma selling Alibaba stocks last year.
Affected by the news of increased holdings, Alibaba's US stock rose 6.8% on January 23, and its Hong Kong stock price also rose by over 6.5% today.
As of July last year, SoftBank's shareholding in Alibaba was still 13.9%, making it the largest shareholder of the company, but it lost a seat on Alibaba's board of directors. According to the agreement between the two parties, SoftBank's right to nominate directors and voting arrangements for Alibaba have actually been terminated. At that time, Cai Chongxin held 1.4% of the shares, while Jack Ma's shareholding number was not disclosed since 2020 when it was below 5%.
In the past two years, in order to reverse the investment dilemma of SoftBank, Sun Zhengyi has continuously reduced his shareholding in Alibaba through forward contracts and monetized his shares.
At the beginning of last year, a document from the US Securities and Exchange Commission showed that SoftBank sold approximately $7.2 billion worth of Alibaba shares, reducing its stake in Alibaba to only 3.8%. These contracts do not equate to a formal sale of stocks, but due to SoftBank's early settlement of these contracts, it means waiving the option to retain shares.
According to media reports, Jack Ma replaced SoftBank as Alibaba's largest shareholder in May last year, when SoftBank's shareholding had dropped to less than 0.5%.
Since Jack Ma stepped down as Chairman of Alibaba's Board of Directors on Teacher's Day in 2019, he has rarely appeared in public. Until last year, his related news began to increase, and the industry generally believed that there was a will behind Alibaba's series of organizational changes.
Jack Ma's stronger control over Alibaba also reflects the enormous pressure brought by his competitor Pinduoduo. Regarding this company that excels in competing for users with ultra-low price products, Jack Ma once responded to its skyrocketing market value on the intranet, stating that he firmly believes that Alibaba will change and Alibaba will change. At present, the adjustment of various business lines of Alibaba is still ongoing.
In the past year, Ali became the most powerful Internet company in China, repurchasing a total of 897.9 million ordinary shares with US $9.5 billion. Jack Ma's firm position as a single major shareholder this time not only boosts market confidence, but also indicates that he will continue to play an important role in the decision-making process.