Concern Growing For Alibaba Upcoming IPO

Los Angeles, CA, May 6, 2014 – With the anticipated massive Alibaba IPO, consumer advocates are raising red flags about the long-term consumer and economic impacts of the proposed $15 Billion IPO.

The International Chamber of Commerce estimates that knockoff products will be a $1.7 trillion (yes, trillion) industry in 2015. These counterfeit products, the majority made in China, will find their way to unsuspecting consumers.

While relatively unknown in the US, China based Alibaba is preparing a $15 billion US Initial Public Stock Offering (IPO) regardless of its history of selling knockoff products. One of Alibaba’s nine subsidiaries, Taobao.com, is only just a year off the US Government’s “Notorious Markets List” which identifies select online and physical marketplaces that reportedly engage in, and facilitate substantial piracy and counterfeiting.

With $240 billion of merchandise traded on Alibaba websites last year, Alibaba is the world’s largest e-commerce company. Alibaba conducts more business than Amazon (AMZN) and eBay (EBAY) combined, and accounts for over half of all parcels shipped in China.

Subsidiary Taobao.com claims over 800 million yearly product listings – but touts diligence in removing 114 million suspected counterfeit product listings in just the first nine months of 2013. That’s a whopping 20% of its product listings removed, but leaves an unanswered question; how many are re-listed? “Still, little or no sleuthing is required to find counterfeit product listings on Alibaba.com, AliExpress.com and Taobao.com websites despite claims of increased site policing. ”Well-known US brands still have hundreds to thousands of counterfeit copies of their goods offered online,” says Craig Crosby, publisher of the popular consumer protection website The Counterfeit Report®.