bloomberg.com
Tencent Holdings Ltd. (700), Asia’s largest Internet company, agreed to buy a $736 million stake in a Craigslist-like site to bolster its online content as it seeks to compete with Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.
Tencent will buy a 19.9 percent stake, amounting to 36.8 million Class A and B ordinary shares in Chaoyang, China-based 58.com at $20 each, the company said in a statement distributed through PR Newswire late on June 27.
Before this, Tencent had racked up at least $258.5 million in mergers and acquisition deals in the second quarter this year, trailing Alibaba Group’s $2.48 billion, according to Bloomberg Industries analyst Tim Craighead.
Tencent’s latest acquisition “can improve the user experience in its mobile platform and attract new customers,” Ricky Lai, a Hong Kong-based analyst at Guotai Junan Securities Co., said by phone.
The investment in NASDAQ-listed 58.com (WUBA), which provides online classified ads, will expand the choice of local services and merchants available to Tencent users, according to the statement. The tie-up will help build 58.com’s user base by capturing traffic from Shenzhen-based Tencent’s messaging services WeChat and QQ, the companies said. |
