Alibaba denies that it’s investing $1 billion in DeepSeek, shares up big anyway

Shares of Alibaba are surging amid conflicting media reports out of China as to whether the e-commerce giant is investing in DeepSeek AI.

Some Chinese media outlets suggested that Alibaba was on the verge of taking a $1 billion stake in the tech firm that seemingly developed competitive AI models on the cheap. But, management is denying that chatter.

Per Reuters:

“The Paper cited a post that Yan Qiao, a vice president at Alibaba, made on her personal WeChat moments feed where she said ‘as a fellow Chinese and Hangzhou company, we applaud DeepSeek, but news circulating that Alibaba will invest in DeepSeek is fake news.’”

Alibaba was already up double digits since DeepSeek’s emergence rattled the US stock market, a standout performer in a broad Chinese tech rally as sentiment shifts regarding the ability of the world’s second-largest economy — and this company in particular — to compete with the US in the AI arena.