Alibaba shares fall 8% after $10B Hong Kong share sale

Alibaba just raised more than $10 billion by selling new shares in Hong Kong. Investors rewarded the effort by dumping the stock. Shares of Alibaba Group opened down roughly 8% on August 24, falling to as low as HK$111 at one point, a decline approaching 10% intraday. The sell-off came despite the placement being nearly three times oversubscribed, with total demand reaching around $28 billion. Inside the deal Alibaba issued 710 million new ordinary shares priced at HK$112.70 each, raising a total of HK$80 billion, or approximately $10.2 billion. That pricing represented a discount of about 8.4% to the prior close. The placement is the largest primary follow-on offering ever for a Hong Kong-listed company. Globally, it ranks as the third-largest in 2026, trailing only similar capital raises from Alphabet and Intel. It’s also Alibaba’s first primary share issuance since its secondary listing in Hong Kong back in September 2019. The new shares come with a 90-day lock-up period. Roughly 40% of the allocation, about $6 billion worth, went to long-only funds and sovereign wealth funds. Where the money is going Alibaba said it plans to direct 100% of the net proceeds toward building out w...