General Atlantic buys stake in SouFun Holdings

By The Associated Press

Private equity firm General Atlantic LLC said Monday it has acquired a 19 percent stake in Chinese real estate website operator SouFun Holdings Ltd. for $163 million.

General Atlantic purchased the shares in SouFun from Telstra International Holdings Ltd.

SouFun, based in Beijing, made its initial public offering on Friday. It's shares closed at $75.50 in their debut, well ahead of the $42.50 they had been priced at a day earlier.

As part of the IPO, Telstra offered 1.8 million of SouFun's American depositary shares.

General Atlantic said it will partner with private equity firm Apax Partners, which will match General Atlantic's investment in SouFun.

In addition, Jeff Leng, General Atlantic's managing director, will join SouFun's board of directors.

SouFun's website got nearly 10 million unique visitors per week last year, when the company had net income of $52.7 million and revenue of $127 million.

SouFun's American depositary shares fell $6.75, or 9.2 percent, to close at $66.75.