Alibaba falls to new post-IPO lows, takes Yahoo down with it
Alibaba (BABA -3.3%) has slumped to new post-IPO lows on a down day for equities, and at one point was just $0.03 above $80. Shares remain 19% above their $68 IPO price.
Yahoo (YHOO -3.8%), which has seen the value of its 384M-share Alibaba stake (set to be spun off) fall to $31.1B, is following Alibaba lower. Yahoo's market cap stands at $41B.
Possibly hurting Alibaba: The WSJ has taken a look at the use of fake orders (i.e. "brushing) by Alibaba merchants to pad their sales and thereby boost their standing on the company's marketplaces.
Merchants pay "brushers" to place orders, and then ship them boxes that are empty or full of worthless items. A November column from China's state-owned Xinhua News Agency estimated 17% of sellers (1.2M) on Alibaba's Taobao site (focused on smaller merchants) had faked RMB10B ($1.6B) worth of transactions in 2013.
Alibaba says it punishes sellers found to be faking transactions, and analyzes IP and mailing address data to spot anomalies. Chinese regulator SAIC recently issued a report criticizing Alibaba for fake goods listings and other illegal business done on its sites, but backtracked after Alibaba blasted the report.
The Chinese e-commerce giant now trades for 28x estimated FY16 (ends March '16) EPS. The FY16 revenue growth consensus is at 36%.
Pray for A Pain Free Day!
