US judge narrows lawsuit against Alibaba, Ant

NEW YORK: A US judge narrowed a lawsuit by the shareholders of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd, accusing the Chinese e-commerce company founded by Jack Ma of misleading them about its monopolistic practices and a shelved initial public offering for its Ant Group affiliate.

On Wednesday, US District Judge George Daniels dismissed all of the claims against Ma, including insider trading.

He said shareholders didn't have standing to sue Ant, which operated the Alipay mobile payment platform, and Alibaba had a 33 per cent stake, because the potential US $37 billion IPO did not happen, and they never bought or sold Ant shares.

Daniels said that the company's practices of requiring merchants to choose only one distribution platform could cause a lawsuit against the company, despite the fact that it did not violate anti-monopoly or unfair competition laws.

In April 2021, Beijing fined Alibaba US $2.75 billion for merchant exclusivity.

Daniels said that defendants may not have had a reasonable basis to assert that their conduct was legal because of the use of exclusivity practices, contrary to Alibaba's public representations and commitments. The lawsuit was brought by investors who bought American depositary shares from Jul 9 to Dec 23, 2020 and said they lost money when the Ant IPOAnt IPO was suspended and Chinese regulators announced an antitrust probe.

The shareholders' lawyers did not respond to requests for comment. Lawyers for Alibaba and Ma did not respond immediately to similar requests.

In January, Ma agreed to give up control of Ant.