Yahoo abandons plan to sell $31bn stake in Chinese e-commerce site Alibaba
by Sam Thielman in New York from Technology | The Guardian on (#X5HQ)
Struggling tech company announces 'reverse spin' that involves keeping Alibaba and spinning itself into a separate publicly traded holding company
Yahoo has abandoned plans to sell its $31bn stake in Chinese e-commerce business Alibaba, announcing instead that it would be keeping Alibaba and getting rid of everything else.
CEO Marissa Mayer and chairman of the company's board Maynard Webb called the process a "reverse spin" in a conference call with investors on Wednesday. Rather than spin off one division, Yahoo will spin itself off into a separate, publicly traded holding company that will contain Yahoo's core business and its stake in Yahoo Japan.