Alibaba Stock Rises After Retail Sales Skyrocket

On Wednesday China’s National Bureau of Statistics reported online retail sales in the country reached $205.8 billion for the first two months of 2018, a 37% increase from a year ago, and an acceleration from the 32% growth rate in the same period in 2017.

Wall Street firm Jeffries opined that “we believe the strong online retail sales in spite of weak seasonality could be attributed to:

1) a longer-than-usual shopping window prior to Chinese New Year (CNY) holiday; 2) increased rural consumption spending over CNY from post-80s with smart home electronics and imported fresh goods showing fast growth; 3) step-up in online-offline promotional efforts, e.g. red packets, Taobao-RTmart (SunArt) promotion; 4) enhanced logistics service for fresh goods, e.g. Hema,” Jefferies analyst Karen Chan said in a note to clients.[1]

Shares of New York-traded Alibaba rose more than 3 percent Thursday morning, hitting a high of $199.50 pershare.[2] The Wall Street Journal also reported early Thursday that the company is considering a moving their stock listing home to mainland China.[3]

[1]http://www.businessinsider.com/alibaba-stock-price-reaping-rewards-skyrocketing-china-online-sales-2018-3

[2]https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/15/alibaba-shares-jump-after-report-its-considering-a-chinese-listing.html

[3]https://www.wsj.com/articles/china-tech-titan-alibaba-plans-stock-market-homecoming-1521116131