DangDang vs. Morgan Stanley in Weibo slanging match

China might have its first good online buzzword of 2011 stemming from an online debate between DangDang CEO Li Guoqing (李国庆) and a Chinese netizen. 

DangDang, one of China's largest online book sellers, listed on the New York Stock Exchange in late 2010.

Now, just over a month later, the company’s CEO, Li Guoqing, has become a talking point due to his heated, profanity-laced exchange with a self-proclaimed Morgan Stanley employee over his Sina Weibo account (Chinese Twitter).

The text of the exchange quickly made its way onto the Baidu top ten search results, and received more than 2,600 comments in less than 24 hours.

Li's comments included IPO pricing allegations as well as some classy “your mother” insults.

"In order to acquire my business, you first priced me at 1-6 billion bucks. However in prospectus the value became only 700-800 million," posted Li about the company's IPO valued by Morgan Standley.

Dangdang sold US$272 million-worth of shares in its IPO, according to the Wall Street Journal.

“I regret not giving the job to Goldman Sachs,” posted Li.

More business-based comments were followed by a number of vulgar insults -- language that was quickly picked up by Chinese netizens -- particularly a “rock song lyric”-based insult, which referred to Morgan Stanley roughly as "king eight egg," which more or less translates as an impure act committed with one's mother.

The woman now referred to by netizens as the “Morgan Stanley woman” (大磨女) posted her response, calling Li, according to a Baidu blog, “a hollow-brained beggar,” and it only got more juvenile from there, bringing Li’s wife and parents into the insult-throwing fray.

The text of the exchange quickly made its way onto the Baidu top 10  search results, and received more than 2,600 comments in less than 24 hours.

(Read the full transcript in Chinese. Read the full conversation in English.)

Although the United States was officially on holiday on Monday, Morgan Stanley issued a statement to the press saying that, “These comments are offensive, highly unprofessional and do not reflect industry practices.”

They also denied that the women who claimed to be a company employee was in fact related to the firm.

DangDang released its own statement saying that the comments of CEO Li Guoqing we definitely his and continued that, “The comments should serve as a warning to other Chinese companies seeking a U.S. listing.”

Li later added a message to his Weibo account, saying, "I've carelessly said a mouthful. Please forgive any offense."

Although few see any lasting consequences to the U.S. IPOs from this row, one thing that is sure to come out of it is the first good Internet meme of 2011. Look for online parodies of Li’s "rock song lyrics," until the next online debacle draws Chinese netizen attention.