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Alibaba
BusinessBanking & Finance

Alibaba guides market on US$5 billion debt sale ahead of pricing on Thursday

  • E-commerce giant guides to a price of around 130 basis points over US Treasuries for its 10- year notes
  • The bond sale comes after Alibaba reported a 37 per cent surge in revenue for the quarter ended December

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Alibaba’s building in Shanghai. Photo: EPA-EFE
Alison Tudor-Ackroyd

Alibaba Group Holding has released guidance to investors on its dollar bond sale of up to US$5 billion ahead of pricing later on Thursday.

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The offering by the Hangzhou-based e-commerce behemoth is its first foray into international debt markets since 2017 when it sold US$7 billion worth of bonds.

The initial price guidance on the planned 10-year tranche was around 130 basis points over US Treasuries; for the 20-year bonds, in the area of 140 basis points; for the 30-year, about 150 basis points; and for the 40-year debt, about 160 basis points, according to a terms sheet seen by the Post.

Alibaba, which owns this newspaper, will fix the exact size of the offering and the bonds’ interest rates after discussing terms with fixed-income investors. It kicked off marketing calls on Wednesday, people familiar said.

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Ratings agency Moody’s labelled the notes as investment grade “A1 Stable” while S&P and Fitch both said they were “A+ Stable”.

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The bond sale comes after Alibaba reported a 37 per cent surge in revenue for the quarter ended December, lifted by its extended Singles’ Day campaign last year and handily beating analysts’ estimates. Companies tend to tap capital markets after releasing fresh financial statements.
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