OSAKA, Japan--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Analysts at Japanese financial services company Osaka Matsui Management have said that billionaire Jack Ma-backed Chinese financial-technology juggernaut Ant Group Co. earned an estimated $3.5 billion during a recent six-month period, demonstrating how lucrative the company's business has been as it moves closer towards a blockbuster initial public offering.

"According to financial results released on Thursday by Alibaba Group which owns 33% of Ant, the soon-to-be-listed company recorded a profit of around 15.5 billion yuan ($2.2 billion) in the quarter ending December 2019, then about 9.2 billion yuan ($1.3 billion) in the following three months ending March," said Alistair Richmond, Director of Corporate Trading at Osaka Matsui Management.

Ant owns Alipay, the hugely successful mobile-payments platform that is used by over 900 million people in China for spending money online and in physical stores, paying bills, taking public transportation, and purchasing big-tickets. The company also offers a variety of financial services to millions of businesses across the country. It provides technology services to financial institutions and other organizations and sells financial products, including insurance policies and mutual funds to countless individuals.

According to data collected by Osaka Matsui Management, the company headquartered in Hangzhou was valued at $150 billion in a private fundraising round in June 2018 and revealed last month that it is planning simultaneous initial public offerings on the Hong Kong and Shanghai stock exchanges. The combined offerings may be one of the biggest in history and will take place around six years after Alibaba's own record-setting $25 billion New York IPO.

Alibaba, which added a second listing in Hong Kong last year, reports financial results using U.S. commonly accepted accounting methods, so its profit figures for Ant may differ from the results that Ant will release in its forthcoming listing prospectus.

"Ant is aiming for a market capitalization of over $200 billion when it goes public. This will make it more valuable than the Goldman Sachs Group and position it close to PayPal, whose market capitalization recently exceeded $220 billion following their big share-price run-up earlier this year," said Michael Carter, Head of Global Equities at Osaka Matsui Management.

The three months to March 2020 included weeks in which several Chinese cities were under lockdowns to prevent the spread of the coronavirus throughout the country. Many restaurants and businesses were closed, and people were primarily confined to their homes during this period, which curbed spending as a result.

Still, accord to Alibaba's filings, Ant's first-quarter profit was more than 500% higher than the same period last year. The companies have not provided reasoning for the year-over-year surge.

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Osaka Matsui Management is a private wealth management company that prides itself on fulfilling clients' goals with passion and integrity. With over $8.4 billion U.S. Dollars of assets under management, Osaka Matsui Management has been assisting both private and corporate clients since 2006.

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