Alibaba overtakes Facebook as world’s sixth-most valuable company after shares soar by 10 per cent in Hong Kong

Alibaba Group Holding’s market capitalisation ballooned after its shares soared on the New York and Hong Kong markets, helping it vault past Facebook to become the world’s sixth-most valuable company.

Shares of the e-commerce and cloud computing giant – also the owner of South China Morning Post – rose 10 per cent in a soaring Hong Kong market to close at a record HK$261.60, after advancing 9 per cent in New York overnight to US$257.68.

That gave the Hangzhou-based company nearly HK$5.614 trillion (US$720 billion) in market capitalisation, more than Facebook’s US$694.53 billion. Tencent Holdings, the only other Chinese stock among the world’s top 10 companies, is capitalised at HK$5.38 trillion based on its latest closing price of HK$563 per share.

Investors are rushing into Alibaba for “fear of missing out” on its strong earnings, according to Jefferies, which recommends its clients “buy” the stock with a target price of HK$307 per share.

“[Alibaba] shows strong execution with multiple business models, and is at the sweet spot of a recovery story backed by strong technological strengths,” Jefferies analysts led by Thomas Chong wrote in a note. “In the June quarter, we expect it to deliver solid results with core marketplace as a strong cash cow and customer management revenue offering high [return on investment] to merchants. We expect a strong recovery in the June quarter.”

The world’s largest company remains Saudi Arabian Oil, better known as Saudi Aramco. The oil exploration company, which went public in December 2019 in the biggest initial public offering (IPO) in global finance, has a market value of US$1.77 trillion.