Alibaba: "Golden Egg" Under Capital

　　 Alibaba's largest IPO staged "the last madness"

More than 10 hours later, Alibaba It's time to ring the bell at the New York Stock Exchange. A few days ago, an entrepreneurial chicken soup named "Ma Yun's initial bragging video" also quietly began to spread on the Internet and in the WeChat circle. For Ma Yun and his team, all the "forbearance" in the previous 15 years was to go to the US capital market on September 19 to "harvest and release". Apart from being worthy of celebration, there is nothing wrong with it.

This is also a typical Ali style public relations rhythm. On the one hand, Ali people celebrate success with loud gongs and drums, and on the other hand, they give alms to feed the losers' hearts with "chicken soup".

However, if you have a certain understanding of Alibaba's history of prosperity, you will find that this is a company that has been "ambitious" since its birth, because in addition to "largest", you can hardly find more appropriate adjectives to describe Alibaba, the "giant" in domestic business: "largest IPO", "largest market value", "largest financing amount" "Largest e-commerce company", "Largest C2C and B2C platform", "Largest payment tool"

Alibaba: "Golden Egg" under Capital

As for how capital is "bloodthirsty", British politician Todd Yo Dunning once said that capital "dares to trample all human laws for 100% profit; with 300% profit, it dares to commit any crime, even risks being beheaded."

Since the birth of the word "new economy", it is well known that the commercial Internet has been matured by capital power. However, domestic Internet entrepreneurs have two completely different attitudes towards the indistinguishable love hate attitude towards capital. One is to admit the rationality of the rules, unwilling to let children get away with wolves. The other is the "entanglement model" of Li Guoqing and Ma Yun in Dangdang, The former once complained that when Dangdang was listed in the United States, its underwriter, Morgan Stanley, set the issue price of Dangdang's shares too low and kept complaining, and even publicly swore with "Da Mo Nu" on Weibo. The latter was engaged in a ten-year equity tug of war with Yahoo, with mutual slanders and public accusations.

Capitalists and entrepreneurs have always been sweet "dew husband and wife" who conspired for a short time. On November 6, 2007, seven years ago, Alibaba's B2B business was officially listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. The offering price was 13.5 Hong Kong dollars, and the closing price reached 39.5 Hong Kong dollars, up nearly 200% on the first day. It was 256 times oversubscribed, and its market value reached 25.7 billion US dollars, surpassing Baidu and Tencent at that time, becoming the first stock in China's Internet. In the previous subscription process, more than HK $453 billion of retail funds were frozen, which was the highest in the history of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. Four months later, its market value fell by HK $150 billion, and its stock price dropped to HK $3.46 at the lowest point. Before the announcement of its privatization in February 2012, its stock price was also less than HK $10. On June 20, 2012, Alibaba completed delisting at HK $13.5 (i.e. the issue price five years ago). Some critics believe that Alibaba "went public for five years and used billions of dollars of interest free loans from shareholders", while the media said that Jack Ma was too smart a capital player. In five years, Alibaba "bought an enterprise with a net profit increase of more than six times and a cash increase of 25 times at par". In the past five years, Alibaba B2B delisted at a low price, and shareholders did not earn any money. In the same period, Baidu and Tencent's stock returns exceeded 10 times.

Today, the same story is happening, but the scene of the story is moved to the New York Stock Exchange.

At the Waldorf Hotel in New York on September 9, 2014, nearly 1000 investors lined up in the lobby. It took 40 minutes just to wait in the elevator, in order to accept the audience of Ma Yun, China's "e-commerce czar"; The roadshow will be oversubscribed within two days; The offering price may be raised to $70

Once Alibaba's powerful propaganda machine starts, the drums and gongs of the show will ring. Fortunately, the stock market in the United States is not like that in Hong Kong. There are not many small and medium-sized investors, and they are not too enthusiastic. I'm afraid that Alibaba, a Chinese company with little understanding, has little interest except for the "China concept". It depends on the appetite of those capital giants.

For Chinese concept stocks whose overall share price performance was good in 2014, Alibaba's listing in the United States had experienced many twists and turns in advance, but there is no doubt that it is still the largest "golden egg" in the capital market this year.

Will China's private equity traders go across the sea to buy new shares and sell them on the same day? On the first day of listing, will Ali's stock rise or fall? Will institutional investors compete to sell or hold for a long time? It will be known in ten hours.

When Alibaba was listed in Hong Kong in 2007, some insiders estimated that about $20 billion of mainland private capital participated in the subscription of Alibaba's new shares that year. How many will there be this time? It is believed that bloodthirsty capital giants have long smelled the smell of profits.

　　 Jack Ma Management Culture: Partner System or "Chinese Management"

September 15, Hong Kong. This should be the last stop of the road show before Alibaba goes public. Ma Yun didn't need to travel in royal clothes at night. This song of "returning home in glory" made a high profile statement to reporters: "Hong Kong lost the opportunity of Alibaba. I think Alibaba missed Hong Kong". Of course, he did not forget to add: "Hong Kong must change for its future as a young person."

Hong Kong shares have rejected Alibaba, which adheres to the "partnership system", because of its consistent principle of equal rights for the same shares. It takes time to prove which is right or wrong. However, Jack Ma's reminder can also be put on Alibaba:

"Can't Ali make changes for the future of the Internet?"

Whether it is a modern enterprise system with the same shares and the same rights, or the AB share system specially designed for Internet start-ups (when entrepreneurs are small shareholders, they can still enlarge their voting rights through B shares to ensure their decision-making position in the company's business), it is a complete set of mature system designs, especially the latter, which is widely used by Google Facebook and other Internet companies that introduce venture capital use it. But the core of Ali's "partnership system" is to ensure that Ali's core management is a "family" business that cannot be moved for generations. For example, 30 partners have the right to nominate the CEO of the company, and more than half of the board members of listed companies are all the exclusive inventions of Ma Yun and his team, Such a system is also full of "Chinese characteristics" that are difficult to explain to outsiders.

Alibaba's "Chinese style" management style goes beyond this. It is like the chivalry culture, which is either black or white, and is like the hilltop culture in Shuiboliang Mountain, where farmers gather for uprisings and "everyone has a share in the fight"; The individual heroism style in the Jianghu advocated by Ma Yun also runs counter to the grayscale color in the commercial culture (Ren Zhengfei) and the transparency and wisdom culture advocated by the Internet industry.

　　 Ali The core meaning of management culture is "control power". From satisfying the control desire of one person to satisfying the control desire of a group of people, it is a small farmer's way of thinking in the agricultural era. It is incompatible with the so-called "new commercial civilization". As for the words "customers first, employees second, shareholders third", they are just slogans posted on the wall for "outsiders" to see, If you are serious, you are too serious.