The Chinese general public knew little about the term VIE (variable interest entities) before the transfer of ownership of the online payments platform Alipay.

Financial website imeigu.com made a simple example of the term by comparing it to house purchasing. "Let's suppose you are a non-Beijinger who doesn't meet the requirements of buying a local house. Then it occurs to you that you may sign a 50-year lease agreement with a potential house seller, pay the rent all at once and then just move in. This is what we call VIE."

The VIE structure, which has been used by many Chinese Internet companies including Sina, Baidu, Sohu and Netease, allows foreign investors in China to gain a degree of control over companies they are not allowed to own directly.

The VIE structure has attracted public attention ever since a dispute erupted last May between Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba and American tech giant Yahoo!, which holds a minority stake in Alibaba through a VIE. Under the VIE structure, Alibaba transferred its successful online payment business Alipay to a company wholly-owned by its CEO Ma Yun in order to comply with new Chinese regulations that bars foreign investment in domestic online payment companies. The dispute raised concerns among investors about the potential risks of the VIE structure.

在支付寶股權轉移之前，中國普通大眾對于可變利益實體（VIE）這個詞是完全陌生的。

財經網站i美股舉了一個簡單的例子，將VIE比作買房子：假設你是非北京戶口，也不滿足在京買房條件。后來你想出了一個辦法，和賣家簽訂了一份50年的出租協議，租金一次性給清，然后你搬進去住了，這就是所謂的VIE。

在中國，某些行業的公司是“外資禁入”的。而通過VIE結構，境外投資人就可以擁有這些公司一定程度的實際控制權。多家中國互聯網公司都應用了VIE結構，新浪、百度、搜狐、網易等都在其中。

去年的支付寶風波引發了大眾對于VIE結構的關注。2011年5月，為了符合網上支付機構限制外資進入的新規定，中國電子商務巨頭阿里巴巴集團將旗下的在線支付公司支付寶的所有權轉移到了一家中國內資公司，由阿里巴巴首席執行官馬云控股。美國科技巨頭雅虎公司此前通過VIE結構持有阿里巴巴的少數股權，因此支付寶的股權轉移引起了阿里巴巴與雅虎之間的糾紛，同時也引發了投資人對于投資VIE結構企業潛在風險的擔憂。