Alibaba reportedly planning to delay much-hyped IPO

Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba is planning to delay its initial public offering, one of the most eagerly anticipated in years, until after the U.S. Labor Day Holiday on September 1, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Alibaba, which analysts have valued at about $20 billion, had been expected to launch its IPO as soon as the end of this month. Company executives were finding it too difficult to generate the necessary paperwork in what has proven to be an overly ambitious timeframe. They want to avoid debuting during the mid-to-late August time period when Wall Street all but shuts down for summer vacation.

Meanwhile, Alibaba executives are preparing their roadshow connected with the deal, a series of face-to-face meetings in major cities around the world with potential investors.

Although Alibaba is often compared with Amazon.com (AMZN) and eBay (EBAY), it is much larger, generating many more sales over its website -- $24o billion worth of transactions in 2013 alone.

Yahoo (YHOO) stands to reap a huge windfall from the deal thanks to its 24 percent stake in the Chinese company. Enthusiasm about Yahoo's Alibaba stake have stoked investor appetite for the shares even as the Internet media company's core advertising business continues to struggle. That was evident after Yahoo's recent disappointing quarterly earnings.

Alibaba's U.S. media relations office couldn't immediately be reached for comment.