by Kara Swisher
Posted on May 13, 2011 at 12:03 AM PT
Back in April of 2009, like all the rest of the parts of the Chinese Internet giant Alibaba Group, its Alipay unit was listed this way on its Web site: “Alipay is wholly owned by Alibaba Group.”
And right now, describing the online payments platform? (my italics): “Alipay is an affiliate of Alibaba Group.”
Memo to Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz: You might have noticed that critical change in Alipay’s corporate status, which happened last August, given the company you lead owns 43 percent of the Alibaba Group.
More to the point, Alipay accounted for $1.7 billion of Yahoo’s valuation.
Not surprisingly, Yahoo shares are down more than six percent in after-hours trading, likely in reaction to an unusual statement by Yahoo yesterday, in which the company said it had no idea that Alibaba CEO Jack Ma had transferred ownership of the Alipay unit to a separate entity until March 31.
Sources said that apparently happened in a letter from Alibaba to Yahoo’s accounting department. Since then, the company said it has been trying to figure it all out.
Said Yahoo:
On March 31, 2011, Yahoo! and Softbank were notified by Alibaba Group of two transactions that occurred without the knowledge or approval of the Alibaba Group board of directors or shareholders. The first was the transfer of ownership of Alipay in August 2010. The second was the deconsolidation of Alipay effective in the first quarter of 2011.
Yahoo! disclosed this restructuring in its 10-Q after discussions with Alibaba Group and obtaining a better understanding of this complex situation.
Yahoo! continues to work closely with Alibaba and Softbank to protect economic value for all interested parties. We believe ongoing negotiations among all of the parties provide the best opportunity to achieve an outcome in the best interest of all stakeholders.
Translation: Alibaba’s Ma—who cites upcoming new rules about foreign ownership from People’s Bank of China related to operating its payment business—just snookered us and we need to play dumb until we decide whether a lawsuit will be a disaster too many for our much beleaguered investors.
Really pissed off shareholders it is more like it—BoomTown has been on the receiving end of an explosive series of calls from Yahoo’s investors today asking a variety of questions.
They include:
1. How could Alibaba have reported its results with Alipay consolidated in, even though it was a separate entity since last year? And does that spell trouble for Yahoo, since it used those numbers in its own regulatory filings in the U.S.?
2. How could Ma initiate such a transaction without approval from shareholders and its board, as Yahoo claims?
3. In any case, why weren’t Yahoo execs paying more attention to the swirling changes related to foreign ownership in China, especially since Yahoo Co-founder Jerry Yang is on the Alibaba board, anticipating that there could be real problems ahead?
4. Why did Yahoo execs not tell shareholders about the situation immediately or even at its April earnings call? Or perhaps before David Einhorn’s hedge fund Greenlight Capital hedge fund took a big position in Yahoo last week, specifically noting the value of the company’s Asian assets as highly attractive.
5. Does this move mean that those pretty Chinese assets Yahoo has touted are not so pretty after all, given that these kind of things can happen there?
6. Should U.S. investors remove themselves from that Chinese market, given that these kind of things can happen there?
7. Is Bartz’s extraordinarily tense personal relationship with Ma a big part of the problem, creating a distasteful public feud over issues better left to quiet backroom negotiations?
There will be plenty more, of course, especially around Yahoo’s disclosures to investors.
Yahoo execs will argue that it did do in the proper manner from a filing point of view and that it did not reveal the fissure so as not to put its negotiations with Alibaba over the situation at risk.
But—especially given the myriad of continued missteps by Bartz that have worked investors’ last nerve—that probably is not going to fly.
In fact, that irked sentiment will surely all be on display at Yahoo’s upcoming investor day on May 25.
Yahoo had hoped to show off its new team of execs and talk about some legitimate momentum the company is making.
Now, it will doubtlessly all be about China and what happened there.
So, Bartz has to have a better line than a take on a Hollywood classic: “Forget it, Wall Street. It’s China.”
Maybe so, but it’s her problem to solve now.