Benefiting from institutional optimism and the overnight surge in the US stock market, Alibaba SW (09988. HK) saw its stock price strengthen after a high opening today, rising nearly 8% during the trading session. As of publication, it rose 6.71% to HKD 85.1.
Note: Alibaba's performance
In terms of news, Citron Research, which was once famous for its aerial concept stocks, recently gave a positive evaluation of Alibaba Group's US stock performance, predicting that its US stock price is expected to break through the $100 mark.
Xiang Juan believes that Alibaba is gaining momentum and its development trajectory in China is expected to follow the successful cases of Microsoft and Amazon. In addition, investors will gradually recognize Alibaba's prospects in the field of artificial intelligence (AI) cloud services and the value of its strategic investment.
Xiang Xiang pointed out that Alibaba's achievements in the field of Large Language Modeling (LLM) are particularly outstanding, and its developed model "Tongyi Qianwen" is in a leading position in the Chinese market.
This news has had a positive impact on Alibaba's US stock price. Alibaba's US listed stocks rose by 7.5% during the trading session, and at the close of the day, the stock rose 7.04% to close at $86.7.
Note: Alibaba's US stock market trend
Why did Xianglian's bullish view of Alibaba attract market attention?
Citron Research is an American bearish organization founded in 2001 by Jewish author Andrew Leford. Citron Research mainly conducts short selling reports, investigates and analyzes the financial data of listed companies, identifies potential financial fraud and other issues, and exposes this information to public investors.
Citron Research has a significant influence in the industry. Over the past six years, it has targeted multiple Chinese concept stock companies, some of which have experienced a stock price drop of over 66%, while others have already been delisted. The short selling report of Citron Research usually attracts market attention and fluctuations in stock prices. However, the short selling behavior of Citron Research also faces regulatory challenges and market credibility tests, and the accuracy and motivation of its short selling reports are sometimes questioned.
However, in January 2021, facing a wave of short selling by retail investors, Xianglian announced that it would "stop short selling research and focus on long trading" in the future.
How is the development of Alibaba's AI cloud business?
As mentioned earlier, the bullish sentiment towards Alibaba is mainly attributed to cloud services. According to the latest financial report released by Alibaba, the cloud business has seen significant revenue growth in the past quarter, achieving a three digit year-on-year growth. Specifically, Cloud Intelligence Group achieved a revenue of 25.595 billion yuan in the quarter, a year-on-year increase of 3%.
In the subsequent financial report conference call, Alibaba's senior management remained optimistic about the prospects of the cloud business, and it is expected that the growth rate of the cloud business will rebound to double digits in the second half of the year. This expected growth will mainly benefit from the newly launched artificial intelligence (AI) products, which will drive customer investment in AI related services, thereby driving the growth of traditional public cloud service products.
In addition, Alibaba Cloud recently launched version 2.5 of "Tongyi Qianwen", which has served over 90000 enterprises through the Alibaba Cloud platform and over 2.2 million enterprises through the DingTalk platform. This indicates that Alibaba's position in the AI cloud service market has been further consolidated, and its service capabilities and market influence continue to strengthen.
Another institution is betting again on Alibaba
According to the 13F report published on the website of the US Securities and Exchange Commission, Scion Asset Management, a hedge fund managed by Michael Barry, the prototype of Big Short, significantly increased its bullish bets on JD.com and Alibaba in the first quarter of this year.
The report shows that as of March 31, Barry has increased its holdings of 160000 JD stocks and 50000 Alibaba stocks, making these two stocks continue to be its top two holdings, accounting for approximately 9.53% and 8.74% of its stock investment portfolio, respectively.
In the past few years, Barry has been repeatedly entering and exiting Chinese technology stocks: since the end of 2022, he has been buying stocks in Alibaba and JD.com. However, in the second quarter of last year, he cleared his holdings in Alibaba and JD.com for a while, but bought them again a few months later. Now, these two stocks have become his top two holdings.