Investors including BlackRock, GIC and Silver Lake have been left holding illiquid stakes in Ant Group after pouring billions of dollars into the Chinese payments company before its $37bn initial public offering was scuttled.
People directly familiar with the matter said the sovereign wealth funds, private equity and asset managers had been left in limbo after investing $10.3bn into Ant International, a subsidiary of the group owned by Jack Ma, in a highly selective, offshore pre-IPO fundraising round in 2018.
But since the blockbuster offering was halted at the last minute by Beijing in November, the people said, these investors had not been given any clarity on when the IPO may be revived, or what its valuation and business would look like after a restructuring that has been demanded by Chinese regulators.