英文原文

ALIBABA SLIDES AFTER YAHOO SELLS STAKE
Shares of Alibaba.com, the world's largest online platform for trade between companies, dropped almost 10 per cent yesterday after Yahoo sold its entire 1 per cent stake in the listed unit for about $150m.

Analysts took the move as an indication that Alibaba.com may be peaking after a sustained rally in its share price since January this year.

But the step again raised questions over Yahoo's long-term commitment as a key shareholder of Alibaba. The US internet company still owns 39 per cent of the unlisted parent of Alibaba.com.

Yahoo sold the stake to realise profits made since Alibaba's 2007 listing.

“Yahoo regularly evaluates its financial investments and the value of its 1 per cent direct IPO investment in Alibaba.com has increased substantially. This increase is why Yahoo sold this financial position,” the company said.

Its move came barely a week after Jack Ma, Alibaba's founder and chairman, sold what the company said was less than 5 per cent of his holdings in the listed unit for HK$270m ($34m).

This was “likely to remove any stigma associated with Yahoo selling shares in Alibaba.com”, said James Mitchell, an analyst at Goldman Sachs, in a research note.

“Alibaba.com shares have rallied sharply, up 300 per cent year to date and up 50 per cent since Yahoo's initial investment.”

Alibaba has had strong growth during the past year, benefiting from the financial crisis as small and medium-sized enterprises turned to the internet as a low-cost marketing channel.

But Yahoo has not profited from this growth. Although the company had hoped that its 2005 tie-up with Alibaba would help it get its feet on the ground in the world's largest internet market by users, the opposite has happened.

According to Analysys, the Beijing-based internet research house, Yahoo's China site is now marginalised with a market share of 6 per cent, compared with close to 30 per cent for Google and more than 60 per cent for Baidu, the local search giant.

中文翻译

全球最大电子商务网上贸易平台阿里巴巴(Alibaba.com)的股价昨日下跌近10%。此前，雅虎(Yahoo)以大约1.5亿美元出售了所持该公司上市部门全部1%的股份。

分析师们认为，此举表明阿里巴巴股价自今年1月以来的持续上涨也许已经见顶。

但是，此举再次给雅虎作为阿里巴巴关键股东的长期承诺划上了问号。这家美国互联网公司仍拥有阿里巴巴未上市母公司39%的股份。

雅虎出手上述股份，以锁定自阿里巴巴2007年上市以来其股价的增值。

“雅虎经常评估其各项金融投资，而本公司对阿里巴巴的1%直接IPO投资的价值，已有大幅增长。这种增值就是雅虎出售此项金融投资的原因，”该公司表示。

就在一周前，阿里巴巴的创始人和董事长马云(Jack Ma)以2.7亿港元（合3400万美元）出售了所持上市部门的部分股票。据该公司称，马云所持股份不到阿里巴巴的5%。

此举“可能消除了雅虎出售阿里巴巴股份的顾忌”，高盛(Goldman Sachs)分析师詹姆斯•米歇尔(James Mitchell)在一份研究报告中表示。

“阿里巴巴股价已大幅上涨，今年迄今上涨了300%，自雅虎最初投资以来也已上涨50%。”

过去一年来，得益于金融危机，阿里巴巴实现了强劲增长，因为中小企业纷纷转向互联网，将其当作一种低成本营销渠道。

但雅虎并未获益于这种增长。虽然该公司曾希望，2005年与阿里巴巴建立联盟关系，将有助于自己在全球用户最多的互联网市场落脚，但实际发生的情况恰好相反。

据北京互联网研究机构——易观国际(Analysys)介绍，雅虎的中国网站现在已被边缘化，市场份额只有6%，而谷歌(Google)的中国市场份额接近30%，中国本土搜索巨擘百度(Baidu)的市场份额超过60%。