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HONG KONG, Jan 6 (Reuters) – Chinese e-commerce director Alibaba Group Holding Ltd plans to raise at least $ 5 billion through the sale of a U.S. dollar denominated bond this month, said four direct acquaintances on the case.
According to an investor response, money could go up to $ 8 billion that Alibaba is likely to use for general corporate spending, one of the people said.
The plan, including the timeline, is not final and may change, the people said, refusing to be signaled by their lack of authority to speak to the media.
Alibaba declined to comment.
The debt-raising plan comes months after a speech in October from billionaire co-founder Jack Ma about a regulation blocking innovation that led to a $ 37 billion public offering ban.
Since then, Chinese regulators have launched an antitrust probe into Alibaba and ordered Ant to shake up its loans and other consumer finance businesses including the creation of a separate real estate company to meet capital requirements.
The fundraising will be a test of investor sentiment towards Alibaba, and will come as Ma’s absence from a public perspective in the past two months has boosted the profitability of social media where it is . (Reporting by Sumeet Chatterjee, Julie Zhu and Kane Wu; Additional report by Scott Murdoch and Anshuman Daga; Editing by Christopher Cushing)