CRI听力:Alibaba Holds Kickoff Meeting in HK to List in US

Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba has held a preliminary meeting in Hong Kong ahead of its planned U.S. initial public offering.

The meeting has been held behind closed doors.

Ronald Wan, chief China Adviser of Asian Capital, says he is not surprised by Alibaba's choice to hold the meeting in Hong Kong, despite the company's decision to list in New York.

"I think Alibaba somehow still wants to maintain a strong presence in Hong Kong, you know, Hong Kong as the international financial center of China."

Elinor Leung is the head of Telecom and Internet Research with CLSA.

"Most of the Chinese internet stocks in the U.S. are covered by Hong Kong, because 100 percent of their business is still made in China."

Alibaba is expected to raise more than Facebook's 16-billion US dollars listing in 2012.

Despite the optimism surrounding the planned listing, Ronald Wan suggests the IPO might not be as thorough as some may hope.

"U.S. authorities may look at the data and look at the economic and financial information about the company. Some of them may be kind of sensitive. They may not list all their business in the U.S. What I think would be sensitive is information about the consumer, information about their logistic network and how they run their business."

Alibaba decided to list in New York after failing to reach an agreement with Hong Kong Exchange and Clearing, the company which operates the Hang Seng, about preferred shares.