The sale accelerates Alibaba’s retreat from physical retail, a major investment initiative spearheaded years ago by previous CEO Daniel Zhang.
Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. agreed to sell its shares in Sun Art Retail Group Ltd. to private equity firm DCP Capital, unloading another high-profile physical commerce asset at a discount to focus on its core online business.
China’s e-commerce pioneer expects gross proceeds of up to HK$12.3 billion (US$1.6 billion or $2.15 billion) from selling its more than 70% holding in the chain of Costco-like hypermart stores. That’s significantly less than the US$3.6 billion Alibaba paid just to double its stake in Sun Art in 2020, and falls far short of Sun Art’s 2024 market value of about US$3 billion. The Chinese retailer’s shares sank as much as 35% in early Hong Kong trading, while Alibaba slid more than 1%.
