The two big stock exchanges in the United States are ready to fight for the right to host the initial public offering of the Alibaba Group, the Chinese Internet giant.
Both the New York Stock Exchange and the Nasdaq stock market have confirmed to Alibaba that they would accept what the company calls a partnership governance structure, in which a group of its founders and top executives would nominate a majority of board members, a spokesman for the Chinese concern said on Monday.
The announcement signals that Nasdaq is still in the race to land the offering, which is expected to value Alibaba at more than $75 billion. It would be the biggest I.P.O. since Facebook‘s market debut last year.
That may come as some consolation for Nasdaq, which lost the competition for Twitter‘s initial offering. Investors and deal makers have speculated that several technical problems - including glitches that hampered Facebook’s offering and system issues that led to a so-called “flash freeze†earlier this year - would affect the exchange’s ability to compete for big-ticket deals.
The Alibaba spokesman said the company still had not hired underwriters, selected a listing exchange or set a timetable on the offering. But people briefed on the matter have previously suggested that an I.P.O. would probably come next year.
The confirmations from both N.Y.S.E. and Nasdaq are unsurprising. Alibaba has been planning to list in the United States after its preferred platform, the Hong Kong stock exchange, refused to accept the partnership structure, which critics have said disenfranchises common shareholders.
Alibaba executives, including the co-founder Joe Tsai, in a blog post last month, have said that the model is meant to preserve the company’s corporate culture and does not create a de facto dual class system. The company has brought out a number of supportive statements from allies like Yahoo and SoftBank as well.
