Whose company is Alibaba?

Last Friday, Alibaba was listed on the New York Stock Exchange, which was undoubtedly one of the biggest news in the global financial world this year. Alibaba was enthusiastically sought after by global investors, not only setting a record for the largest IPO in the US stock market, but also soaring 38.07% on the first day of listing, with a market value of up to US$231.4 billion, surpassing Facebook, IBM, Amazon and other companies, and second only to Apple, Google and Microsoft, becoming the world's fourth largest high-tech company and the world's second largest Internet company.

However, many people are concerned about another topic - whose company Alibaba is. Since Alibaba's largest shareholder, Japan's SoftBank Group, holds 34.1% of the shares, and the second largest shareholder, Yahoo, holds 22.4% of the shares, and SoftBank is the largest shareholder of Yahoo, some people have concluded that Alibaba is a Japanese company.

This statement obviously lacks understanding of the company structure. Alibaba is registered in the Cayman Islands. According to Chinese law, it should be considered an overseas company. Therefore, according to current Chinese law, Alibaba cannot be listed on the A-share market. However, according to US law, Alibaba is obviously a Chinese company because the US does not pay attention to the company's registration location, but mainly looks at where the company's business income comes from, and most of Alibaba's income comes from mainland China.

Looking at the control of the company, more shares does not mean more voting rights. After a series of operations, Jack Ma and his management team have an advantage in voting rights. The voting rights of Softbank and Yahoo are less than 50% in total. In addition to the partnership system, Jack Ma and his management team completely control Alibaba, while Softbank and Yahoo have become pure financial investors. Therefore, Alibaba is a company owned by Jack Ma and his management team. It is essentially a Chinese company, not a Japanese company at all.

Of course, SoftBank has made a lot of money, but when Jack Ma started his business in 2000, he couldn't find anyone to invest. Masayoshi Son invested $20 million after a brief exchange with Jack Ma. It makes no sense for SoftBank to be jealous now. More importantly, when Alibaba's B2B business went public in 2007, SoftBank's return on investment was nearly 70 times. If it were a Chinese investor, with such a high return rate, he would have sold the shares long ago. But SoftBank did not cash out and left, but continued to hold shares. Now, based on Alibaba's closing price on the first day of listing, the Alibaba shares held by SoftBank are worth $78.9 billion, with a return rate of 342 times.

Therefore, investment requires not only a good vision but also determination. It is difficult to obtain good returns if you always want to get rich overnight.

As a winner of Toutiao's Qingyun Plan and Baijiahao's Bai+ Plan, the 2019 Baidu Digital Author of the Year, the Baijiahao's Most Popular Author in the Technology Field, the 2019 Sogou Technology and Culture Author, and the 2021 Baijiahao Quarterly Influential Creator, he has won many awards, including the 2013 Sohu Best Industry Media Person, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Beijing Third Place, the 2015 Guangmang Experience Award, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Finals Third Place, and the 2018 Baidu Dynamic Annual Powerful Celebrity.