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FinanceAlibaba Group Inc.

On Alibaba’s big day, Jack Ma is an $18 billion winner

By
Benjamin Snyder
Benjamin Snyder
Managing Editor
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By
Benjamin Snyder
Benjamin Snyder
Managing Editor
Down Arrow Button Icon
September 19, 2014, 6:33 PM ET
Alibaba Group CEO Jack Ma
Alibaba Group CEO Jack MaBloomberg—Getty Images

With Alibaba’s first big day on the New York Stock Exchange come and gone, the dust has settled leaving CEO Jack Ma with $18 billion – on paper, at least.

Ma, who founded the company in his apartment in Hangzhou 15 years ago, was worth $13 billion as of Thursday when shares were priced at $68. But that rocketed to $5 billion higher after Friday’s close.

On Friday, shares closed at $93.89 up 38% from the initial pricing, meaning Ma’s stake in the company soared to just over $18 billion. The company’s total market value now exceeds $231 billion.

Ma sold 12.75 million shares in the IPO, which is just a fraction of his 206.1 million total ahead of the IPO. That sale earned him $867 million.

Ma, of course, wasn’t the only one to earn big from the Chinese e-commerce giant’s public debut. Yahoo, too, has cause to celebrate. The tech company is making billions from the 121.7 million shares of Alibaba it is selling. Yahoo, however, ended trading on Friday down about 3%.

There’s also Softbank CEO Masayoshi Son, who owns a big Alibaba stake, who became the richest man in Japan following the Alibaba IPO. Son saw his net worth jump to of $16.6 billion after Softbank’s shares gained 16% since last week.

The company, meanwhile, holds a 34% stake in Alibaba Group.

 

About the Author
By Benjamin SnyderManaging Editor
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Benjamin Snyder is Fortune's managing editor, leading operations for the newsroom.

Prior to rejoining Fortune, he was a managing editor at Business Insider and has worked as an editor for Bloomberg, LinkedIn and CNBC, covering leadership stories, sports business, careers and business news. He started his career as a breaking news reporter at Fortune in 2014.

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