BABA Stock Price Forecast: Alibaba Group Holding continues to slide amidst ANT IPO suspension

It has been a tough week for NYSE:BABA as shares of the eCommerce giant have dropped 7% since the start of the week, as investors have retreated after the news of Jack Ma stirring the pot amongst Chinese officials. The powerhouse stock fell a further 2.69% on Thursday and closed the most recent trading session at $287.75, although at one point, it dipped as low as $279.60. Alibaba reported its third-quarter earnings on Thursday and while the results were more or less in line with expectations, the stock continued its tumble throughout the day.

The catalyst for the recent slump is the suspension of another Jack Ma company, Ant Group, a fintech juggernaut in China that was set to IPO in the largest single public market debut in history at $37 billion. After an uncharacteristically vicious speech given by Jack Ma at a summit in Shanghai in late October, Chinese officials and regulators suspended the Ant Group IPO as retaliation to Ma’s criticisms. While things should eventually settle down, the suspension of the IPO is believed to be for at least a few months and Alibaba’s stock seems to be taking a brunt of the punishment in the short-term. 

BABA stock forecast

The recent dip actually presents itself as a nice buying opportunity for investors who are long on Alibaba. As China recovers from the coronavirus pandemic, it has seen its economy reopen and Alibaba expects big things on November 11th, which is its equivalent to Prime Day or Black Friday in America. Another revenue stream is Alibaba Cloud, a direct competitor to Azure, Google Cloud, and Amazon Web Services. Alibaba Cloud has seen a 60% year-over-year growth in sales and should continue to grow moving forward.