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Alibaba (BABA) Stock Sinks As Market Gains: What You Should Know

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Alibaba (BABA - Free Report) closed the most recent trading day at $93.41, moving -1.22% from the previous trading session. This change lagged the S&P 500's 0.39% gain on the day.

Heading into today, shares of the online retailer had gained 2.67% over the past month, lagging the Retail-Wholesale sector's gain of 4% and the S&P 500's gain of 3.16% in that time.

Wall Street will be looking for positivity from Alibaba as it approaches its next earnings report date. On that day, Alibaba is projected to report earnings of $1.90 per share, which would represent year-over-year growth of 8.57%. Our most recent consensus estimate is calling for quarterly revenue of $31.21 billion, up 1.71% from the year-ago period.

Looking at the full year, our Zacks Consensus Estimates suggest analysts are expecting earnings of $8.08 per share and revenue of $132.44 billion. These totals would mark changes of +1.76% and +5.07%, respectively, from last year.

Any recent changes to analyst estimates for Alibaba should also be noted by investors. Recent revisions tend to reflect the latest near-term business trends. As such, positive estimate revisions reflect analyst optimism about the company's business and profitability.

Our research shows that these estimate changes are directly correlated with near-term stock prices. To benefit from this, we have developed the Zacks Rank, a proprietary model which takes these estimate changes into account and provides an actionable rating system.

The Zacks Rank system, which ranges from #1 (Strong Buy) to #5 (Strong Sell), has an impressive outside-audited track record of outperformance, with #1 stocks generating an average annual return of +25% since 1988. Within the past 30 days, our consensus EPS projection has moved 1.61% higher. Alibaba currently has a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).

Digging into valuation, Alibaba currently has a Forward P/E ratio of 11.7. For comparison, its industry has an average Forward P/E of 20.73, which means Alibaba is trading at a discount to the group.

Also, we should mention that BABA has a PEG ratio of 0.59. This metric is used similarly to the famous P/E ratio, but the PEG ratio also takes into account the stock's expected earnings growth rate. BABA's industry had an average PEG ratio of 1.2 as of yesterday's close.

The Internet - Commerce industry is part of the Retail-Wholesale sector. This industry currently has a Zacks Industry Rank of 160, which puts it in the bottom 37% of all 250+ industries.

The Zacks Industry Rank gauges the strength of our industry groups by measuring the average Zacks Rank of the individual stocks within the groups. Our research shows that the top 50% rated industries outperform the bottom half by a factor of 2 to 1.

Make sure to utilize Zacks.com to follow all of these stock-moving metrics, and more, in the coming trading sessions.


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