Alibaba Group (NYSE:BABA) Downgraded to “Strong Sell” Rating by Zacks Research

Zacks Research cut shares of Alibaba Group (NYSE:BABA) from a hold rating to a strong sell rating in a research report released on Wednesday morning,Zacks.com reports.

BABA has been the topic of a number of other reports. Barclays dropped their price objective on shares of Alibaba Group from $190.00 to $186.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Tuesday, April 14th. Robert W. Baird dropped their price objective on shares of Alibaba Group from $174.00 to $164.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, March 20th. Arete Research raised shares of Alibaba Group from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $190.00 target price on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, January 21st. Loop Capital set a $140.00 target price on shares of Alibaba Group in a research report on Tuesday, January 6th. Finally, Weiss Ratings downgraded shares of Alibaba Group from a “buy (b-)” rating to a “hold (c+)” rating in a research report on Friday, February 27th. Sixteen equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, five have given a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $187.68.

Alibaba Group Trading Down 3.5%

Shares of NYSE:BABA opened at $131.65 on Wednesday. Alibaba Group has a 52 week low of $103.71 and a 52 week high of $192.67. The company’s 50 day moving average is $135.36 and its two-hundred day moving average is $152.88. The company has a current ratio of 1.33, a quick ratio of 1.33 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.22. The company has a market cap of $314.88 billion, a PE ratio of 24.84, a P/E/G ratio of 2.45 and a beta of 0.50.

Alibaba Group (NYSE:BABA) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Saturday, February 14th. The specialty retailer reported $0.13 EPS for the quarter. Alibaba Group had a net margin of 9.12% and a return on equity of 7.43%. The company had revenue of $40.71 billion for the quarter. Equities analysts predict that Alibaba Group will post 4.39 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of the stock. Capital World Investors grew its position in shares of Alibaba Group by 7.7% in the 4th quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 6,505,165 shares of the specialty retailer’s stock valued at $953,527,000 after buying an additional 466,847 shares during the last quarter. Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. grew its position in shares of Alibaba Group by 7,680.3% in the 4th quarter. Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. now owns 6,014,147 shares of the specialty retailer’s stock valued at $881,554,000 after buying an additional 5,936,847 shares during the last quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC grew its position in Alibaba Group by 0.8% during the 4th quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 5,335,894 shares of the specialty retailer’s stock worth $782,135,000 after purchasing an additional 42,297 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank purchased a new position in Alibaba Group during the 4th quarter worth $594,477,000. Finally, American Century Companies Inc. grew its position in Alibaba Group by 17.7% during the 3rd quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 2,987,539 shares of the specialty retailer’s stock worth $533,964,000 after purchasing an additional 448,484 shares during the last quarter. 13.47% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Key Stories Impacting Alibaba Group

Here are the key news stories impacting Alibaba Group this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Alibaba is reportedly in advanced talks with Tencent to invest in Chinese AI startup DeepSeek, a move that would accelerate Alibaba’s AI capabilities and signal a strategic bet on foundation models and talent. Read More.
• Positive Sentiment: Alibaba is expanding Qwen AI into cars (Beijing auto show) to enable voice ordering, bookings and payments — a commercialization path that could open new enterprise revenue and sticky consumer use cases. Read More.
• Positive Sentiment: Qwen has been opened to partners such as China Eastern, allowing flight search and booking via natural language — evidence Alibaba is pushing agentic AI integrations that can be monetized across services. Read More.
• Positive Sentiment: Alibaba Cloud is partnering to make Qwen models accessible on-chain to AI agents (0G collaboration), which could broaden developer usage and enterprise adoption in web3/agentic workflows. Read More.
• Neutral Sentiment: DeepSeek released a V4 preview, escalating the open-source AI arms race in China; more capable open models increase competition but also validate the market Alibaba is investing in. Read More.
• Neutral Sentiment: Tencent and other rivals are unveiling upgraded models, intensifying competition in China’s AI stack; that raises the bar for product differentiation but is not an immediate revenue threat. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Zacks Research downgraded Alibaba from “hold” to “strong sell,” a near-term catalyst that can pressure sentiment and trading activity. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Coverage has noted increasing regulatory scrutiny of China’s large platforms as they expand data-rich, AI-driven services — a structural risk that could affect monetization and speed of rollout. Read More.

About Alibaba Group

Alibaba Group Holding Limited is a Chinese multinational conglomerate founded in 1999 in Hangzhou, China, by Jack Ma and a group of co‑founders. The company built its business around internet-based commerce and related services and has grown into one of the largest e-commerce and technology companies in the world. Alibaba completed a high‑profile initial public offering on the New York Stock Exchange in 2014.

The company operates a portfolio of online marketplaces and platforms serving different customer segments: Alibaba.com for global and domestic B2B trade, Taobao for consumer-to-consumer shopping, and Tmall for brand and retailer storefronts targeted at Chinese consumers.