Here's why Ant Group is about to shatter IPO records

HONG KONG (AP) — Stella Su, who lives and works in Shanghai, has used an ATM only once in the past year. Instead of cash, in recent years she has done almost all her business using the digital wallet Alipay –- shopping in a mall, buying stuff online or transferring money to friends.

“Now when I go out, I don’t even need to carry my wallet, all I need is my phone,” said Su, one of over a billion Alipay users in China and abroad.

Alipay, operated by Ant Group, is the world’s largest and most valuable financial technology (fintech) company and one of two dominant Chinese digital wallets in China, the other being rival Tencent’s WeChat Pay.

Thanks to the huge scale and potential of China’s fintech landscape, Ant Group is poised to raise about $34.5 billion in the world’s largest share offering, beating Saudi Aramco’s previous record of $29.4 billion. Ahead of the IPO, the company will be valued at about $280 million.

To tap both Chinese and global investors, Ant Group is listing its shares both in Shanghai and Hong Kong. It is due to begin trading in Hong Kong on Nov. 5. The Shanghai debut has yet to be announced.

Even before announcing its IPO plans, Ant Group was the world’s most valuable fintech company, with a valuation of $150 million after a 2018 fundraising round.

“Ant Group is much more than PayPal which only processes financial payments. It has a lot of businesses in other areas and with other services that would help 1.3 billion people in China,” Jackson Wong, asset management director at Amber Hill Capital Ltd., said in an interview. “We are betting that Ant Group will be able to grow at a very high pace in the future.”

Alipay and WeChat Pay have helped make Chinese society virtually cashless, at least in big cities, with...