China’s DMall Seeks Half-Billion-Dollar American IPO

China’s DMall ECommerce Co. has engaged Bank of America, Goldman Sachs and J.P. Morgan for a U.S. initial public offering (IPO) of more than $500 million, according to a report published on Thursday (March 18) by Reuters.

The listing could happen in the latter half of the year, according to a source close to the deal. Dmall, founded in 2015, chose to go public with an IPO over a merger with a special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC), sources told Reuters.

The sources declined to be identified, as the information is confidential. Dmall did not immediately reply to Reuters’ request for comment, while BofA, Goldman and J.P. Morgan all declined to comment on the proposed deal.

This news follows a report from Bloomberg last month that DMall was considering an IPO. According to the report, DMall owner Wumart Group was also considering a public offering on the Hong Kong exchange that would be separate from DMall’s listing.

Founded by Feng Zhang, Jiangfeng Liu, Jie Lin, Wenzhi Li, Wenzhong Zhang and Xin Han, DMall offers tools to help retailers launch their eCommerce operations. Since October, the company has worked with more than 120 chain stores covering 13,000 storefronts. Aside from Wumart, DMall is also backed by Tencent, IDG Capital, Lenovo Capital and Incubator Group. Also known as Wumei, Wumart is one of China’s leading retailers — operating 1,000-plus stores across the country — and the biggest supermarket chain in the Beijing-Tiajin-Hebei region.

Meanwhile, eCommerce sales are poised to hit the trillion-dollar mark. As PYMNTS reported earlier this week, the Adobe Digital Economic Index report estimates consumers in the U.S. spent $884 billion online from March 2020 to February of this year. Adobe estimates that eCommerce sales could reach between $850 billion and $930 billion this year, and could reach the trillion-dollar milestone next year.

More than half of American economic growth during the pandemic has stemmed from eCommerce, with more than half of consumers saying they would pay more for convenience.