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Luke Kawa

Stars align for Alibaba with Tepper’s billion-dollar bet, de minimis exemption intact

Shares of Alibaba have been on a tear, up more than 6% on Monday and about 30% year to date. A few factors behind today’s rally and the broader ascent:

  • The “de minimis” exemption, which allows cheap imported goods from the likes of Alibaba and PDD Holdings (the parent company of Temu) to avoid duties, remains intact.

  • Trusted by Tepper: a filing from Appaloosa Management, the hedge fund run by billionaire David Tepper, showed that he added even more to the firm’s top holding in the fourth quarter.

  • AI signal and noise: BABA has a model that it says is better than OpenAI’s or DeepSeek’s. The stock has also gotten a bid from chatter that it would be taking a position in the fellow Hangzhou company (which management denied).

  • Valuation: BABA’s relatively cheap. Probably the best US megacap comparison is Amazon, and the valuation discrepancy is humungous. Alibaba’s forward price-to-earnings ratio is roughly 11.5x versus 32.2x, with an enterprise value to estimated EBITDA of ~6.9x versus 14.6x. Obviously, China’s not a shareholder-friendly jurisdiction (just look at a long-term chart of the MSCI China Index!), so there should be a reasonable valuation premium for American assets. But these premiums are well above their respective 10-year averages.

Alibaba is scheduled to report earnings on February 20.

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SpaceX gets a wave of bullish ratings from Wall Street analysts

SpaceX received more than a dozen positive analyst calls on Tuesday — including from major Wall Street banks — as they initiate coverage on Elon Musk’s space and AI company.

SpaceX went public on June 12 at a $2.2 trillion valuation, the largest debut in history. While the company hasn’t yet posted a profit, it seems to have convinced Wall Street that it will get there and grow its valuation on the way.

Of the at least 17 analysts that gave a rating on Tuesday, all but one gave it a “buy” or “outperform” rating. MoffettNathanson was "neutral."

The ratings come as SpaceX joined the Nasdaq 100 index, a benchmark tech-heavy basket of companies that underpins millions of portfolios. The inclusion adds built-in demand for the stock from index funds and ETFs.

Still, SpaceX fell more than 5% on Tuesday amid a broader sell-off, and is currently effectively flat from its opening price of $150 a share.

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Nike sinks to lowest level since 2014 after warning of “challenged” sales environment in Q4 report

Did Nike do it?

Investors had a mixed reaction after the global sports apparel company reported its fourth quarter earnings on Tuesday after the bell. Shares initially rose 5% as Nike beat out Wall Street expectations amid a hefty tariff refund bonus. However, the stock then sank to its lowest level since August 2014 in postmarket trading.

Here are the Q4 numbers:

  • Revenue of $11.0 billion (estimate: $10.8 billion).

  • Adjusted earnings per share of $0.20 (estimate: $0.12).

Ahead of this report, Nike warned that results would be flattered by a one-time tariff refund (now estimated at roughly $0.52 per share for the bottom line). That gave the company an extra cushion in snapping its streak of seven quarters of year-over-year profit declines.

Over the past year, the company had been punished by tariffs on imported goods, stagnant consumer spending, and increasing competition from other footwear brands like New Balance, Adidas, and Hoka.

Outgoing CFO Matthew Friend deemed it an “increasingly challenging operating environment, where sell-through remains challenged.”

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