ALIBABA Group Holding Ltd. disclosed Friday that it would pay US$15.8 million in legal fees to law firm Simpson Thacher and other attorneys who advised the Chinese e-commerce giant on its upcoming initial public offering (IPO), six times what Facebook Inc. paid its counsel two years ago.

    Alibaba, which is seeking to raise as much as US$21 billion in an IPO expected later this month, made the disclosure in a prospectus Friday filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

    The firm, whose sales are larger than Amazon.com and eBay combined, has a complex structure and has frequently revised its prospectus. That has all increased legal fees.

    The legal fees for Alibaba’s IPO rank the fourth highest in the past 10 years, according to IPO Vital Signs.

    The 2013 IPO of Empire State Realty trust ranked the highest, with a whopping US$32.8 million in estimated legal fees, while the IPO of Kinder Morgan in 2011 cost the pipeline company US$17 million. The 2005 IPO of investment bank Lazard cost US$16 million.

    Facebook’s May 2012 IPO garnered US$2.6 million in legal fees.

    In addition to Simpson, Alibaba’s New York-based law firm, its Chinese counsel, Fangda Partners, and Cayman Islands adviser Maples and Calder, will share the attorneys’ fees, according to the filing.

    It was not immediately clear how the firms would split the US$15.8 million in fees, but Simpson likely will get the lion’s share of the money.

    Alibaba expects to price its initial public offering between US$60 and US$66 per American Depository Share, valuing the company at about US$162.69 billion at the top end of the range and raising as much as US$21.1 billion.

    Simpson, a leading Wall Street law firm with strong corporate, mergers and acquisitions and capital markets practices, has advised on 76 IPOs over the past 10 years, and its record fee before Alibaba was US$15 million for the 2007 IPO of private equity firm Blackstone, according to IPO Vital Signs.

    Lawyers had expected Alibaba fees to be high even before Friday’s disclosure. (SD-Agencies)