On Wednesday, Alibaba ADR’s shares spiked after its founder, Jack Ma, commended the Chinese tech giant’s year-long reorganization.
The Hangzhou-headquartered company’s stock advanced 2.19% to $74.59 per share on April 10, extending its winning streak to three days. Nevertheless, industry watchers predict a slight correction of 0.13% down to $74.50 apiece in the coming market session.
Alibaba has lost billions of dollars in market value from its peak of over $300.00 per share three years earlier. Its decline began in November 2020 after Beijing canceled the IPO of its affiliate e-commerce platform Ant Group.
China spent 2021 and 2022 executing strict regulatory crackdowns on top tech companies, impacting much of Jack Ma’s business empire. This prompted the Chinese billionaire to retreat from public life, leaving all decision-making to then-Alibaba CEO Daniel Zhang.
However, Beijing eased its crackdowns early last year and began supporting the recovery of the most adversely affected corporations. Shortly after, Alibaba announced that it was splitting into six independent business units to increase the company’s overall agility.
Market analysts lauded Ma’s reemergence as an effective means of boosting confidence in the company among employees, investors, and consumers. Stakeholders expressed optimism that Ma may start actively helping Alibaba fine-tune its new corporate structure.
Jack Ma Sets Three-Year Ultimatum for Alibaba
According to Jack Ma, Alibaba must reinvent its e-commerce strategy in three years to reclaim its position as a leading tech giant. Ma emphasized the critical role of artificial intelligence (AI) in facilitating company-wide future-oriented transformations.
The 59-year-old e-commerce pioneer proved his confidence in the new Alibaba by acquiring $50.00 million in stock throughout Q4 2023. He praised the company’s current management, Chairman Joseph Tsai and CEO Eddie Wu, for their courage in admitting their mistakes and reorganizing the firm.
Nonetheless, Jack Ma cautioned that they should focus less on catching up and more on improving tomorrow’s e-commerce experience. Lastly, he said that Alibaba must complete its transformation within three years, or it will be too late.
