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He used to be boss of a tech giant. Now he’s studying fish and rice. The peregrinations of Jack Ma , co-founder of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., over the past year have included a visit to a Japanese lab specializing in farmed tuna—where the staff didn’t recognize him—and a Dutch university to learn about sustainable food production.

☆ Alibaba to Split Into Six Groups and Explore IPOs in a Departure From Jack Ma Era
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-28 | by ( Raffaele Huang | Clarence Leong | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. said it plans to split itself into six independently run companies that could seek separate IPOs, effectively dismantling a business empire built over two decades by charismatic entrepreneur Jack Ma just as the tycoon reappeared in China. The reorganization of one of China’s largest private companies, once valued at more than $800 billion but now worth about a quarter of that, comes after Chinese authorities signaled in recent months they were winding down a sweeping regulatory clampdown aimed at reining in the country’s powerful tech sector.

☆ Alibaba to Split Into Six Separate Groups in Biggest Shake-Up
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-28 | by ( Clarence Leong | Raffaele Huang | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Alibaba plans to split itself into six independently run entities. Chinese tech giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. plans to split its business into six independently run entities, the biggest structural overhaul in its history—announced a day after co-founder Jack Ma was seen back in mainland China after almost a year overseas. Alibaba Group will become a holding company overseen by current Chairman and Chief Executive Daniel Zhang , the company said in a statement on Tuesday.

Bank shares rebounded sharply on Monday after First Citizens BancShares Inc (FCNCA.O) said it would acquire the deposits and loans of Silicon Valley Bank, whose collapse earlier this month sparked a selloff in the sector. "The fact that we've got answers on Silicon Valley Bank, Signature Bank and Credit Suisse means that we have more answers than questions," said Art Hogan, chief market strategist at B Riley Wealth in Boston. Lawmakers are expected to put U.S. bank regulators on the defensive over the unexpected failures of regional lenders Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank when they testify before Congress later on Tuesday. The S&P 500 and Dow rose on Monday after the SVB deal was announced, while the Nasdaq Composite closed lower, led by a decline in technology-related stocks. The S&P index recorded five new 52-week highs and no new low, while the Nasdaq recorded 13 new highs and 40 new lows.

SummarySummary Companies Futures down: Dow 0.10%, S&P 0.17%, Nasdaq 0.22%March 28 (Reuters) - U.S. stock index futures slipped on Tuesday as Treasury yields rose amid easing worries about a banking crisis following First Citizens BancShares' U.S. regulator-backed deal for failed Silicon Valley Bank. Shares of First Citizens BancShares Inc (FCNCA.O) fell 1% in premarket trading after surging more than 50% on Monday following its deal to acquire the deposits and loans of failed Silicon Valley Bank. Regional banks also rose, led by First Republic Bank's (FRC.N) 2.2% gain after a 12% rally on Monday. Later in the day, Fed Vice Chair for Supervision Michael Barr will testify before the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs on "bank oversight" in the first of several hearings on the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank. ET, Dow e-minis were down 31 points, or 0.1%, S&P 500 e-minis were down 6.75 points, or 0.17%, and Nasdaq 100 e-minis were down 27.75 points, or 0.22%.

☆ Alibaba to split into six units
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-28 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

March 28 (Reuters) - Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (9988.HK) said it plans split its business into six main units covering e-commerce, media and the cloud, adding that each of the units will explore fundraising or initial public offerings. STUART COLE, HEAD MACRO ECONOMIST AT EQUITI CAPITAL, LONDON"I am not sure how quickly Alibaba could be broken up. To me, it suggests something that Alibaba has been wanting to do for some time, but has been waiting for the opportunity to do so." With this expectation, investors will be more positive on Alibaba. It may reflect a new round of development for the business and reduce worries of regulatory issues."

☆ Alibaba Co-Founder Jack Ma Returns to China After a Year Away
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-27 | by ( Keith Zhai | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Chinese tech billionaire Jack Ma has kept a low profile since November 2020. Jack Ma , Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.’s billionaire co-founder, has returned to mainland China after spending roughly a year overseas, according to people familiar with the matter. Mr. Ma’s travels have been the subject of intense scrutiny as China’s leadership seeks to regain the confidence of entrepreneurs following years of regulatory clampdowns and Covid-19 pandemic measures that battered the country’s private businesses. The tech titan’s extensive time abroad was interpreted by some in the business world as evidence that uncertainty still clouded the tech sector.

☆ China's super rich population drops as tech crackdown, global factors hurt wealth
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-23 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

[1/3] Jack Ma, billionaire founder of Alibaba Group, arrives at the "Tech for Good" Summit in Paris, France May 15, 2019. China lost 229 billionaires from the Hurun Global Rich List 2023, accounting more than half of the 445 people who disappeared from the list, which ranks moguls with a minimum net worth of $1 billion, the Hurun Report said on Thursday. The world's second biggest economy also added 69 new billionaires to the list during the period. In China, Jack Ma, founder of China's e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding , dropped to 52nd place from 34th a year earlier, due largely to China's regulatory crackdown on its tech sector. "The only thing I am not certain of is whether there would be a global financial crisis," he said.

☆ Chinese search giant Baidu invests in RISC-V chip technology startup StarFive
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-23 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

SHANGHAI, March 23 (Reuters) - Shanghai-based RISC-V chip technology company StarFive said on Thursday that it has received a strategic investment from Chinese search giant Baidu Inc (9888.HK). The company added that to date it has raised 1 billion yuan ($146.46 million) in financing, calling that a first for the domestic RISC-V sector. In a statement, StarFive CEO Xu Tao said that StarFive would work with Baidu to implement RISC-V products in data centres. StarFive was established in 2018 as a China-facing offshoot of SiFive, a RISC-V instruction set architecture (ISA) chip design company based in California. Baidu's investment comes as enthusiasm for RISC-V rises within China's chip sector.

SAN FRANCISCO, March 21 (Reuters) - Nvidia Corp (NVDA.O), the U.S. semiconductor designer that dominates the market for artificial intelligence (AI) chips, said it has modified its flagship product into a version that is legal to export to China. On Tuesday, the company said it has similarly developed a China-export version of its H100 chip. The rules around AI chips imposed a test that bans those with both powerful computing capabilities and high chip-to-chip data transfer rates. A chip industry source in China told Reuters the H800 mainly reduced the chip-to-chip data transfer rate to about half the rate of the flagship H100. The Nvidia spokesperson declined to say how the China-focused H800 differs from the H100, except that "our 800 series products are fully compliant with export control regulations."

In a 31-page decision on Wednesday, U.S. District Judge George Daniels in Manhattan also dismissed all claims against the billionaire Ma, including for insider trading. Beijing announced an antitrust probe in Dec. 2020, and fined Alibaba $2.75 billion four months later for requiring "merchant exclusivity" to do business. Daniels said Alibaba shareholders lacked standing to sue over Ant, because the IPO did not happen and thus they never bought or sold Ant shares. He said they could sue Alibaba, Chief Executive Daniel Zhang and former Chief Financial Officer Maggie Wu over the antitrust compliance statements. The case is In re Alibaba Group Holding Ltd Securities Litigation, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, No.

☆ Futures rise after bank rout, CPI data awaited
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-14 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

ET (1330 GMT) from the Labor Department, will feed into the U.S. Federal Reserve's policy decision at its March meeting. On a yearly basis, CPI grew 6.0% in February, moderating from a 6.4% in rise the previous month. SVB Financial's (SIVB.O) sudden shutdown and fears of risks to other banks hammered the sector and broader markets in the past few days. "The CPI figures out later will be watched super-closely as another hot reading will reinforce expectations that a rate rise, albeit smaller, will be on the cards next week." ET, Dow e-minis were up 117 points, or 0.37%, S&P 500 e-minis were up 16.25 points, or 0.42%, and Nasdaq 100 e-minis were up 56 points, or 0.47%.

☆ China's JD.com reports higher fourth-quarter adjusted profit
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-09 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

March 9 (Reuters) - Chinese e-commerce firm JD.com Inc (9618.HK), reported a higher quarterly adjusted profit on Thursday as China lifted strict pandemic-related curbs late last year. JD.com's net income attributable to ordinary shareholders in the fourth quarter was 3 billion yuan ($430.92 million), compared with a net loss of 5.2 billion yuan a year earlier. Revenue rose 7.1% to 295.4 billion yuan in the three months ended December, missing analysts' estimates of 296.17 billion yuan, according to Refinitiv data. Parts of China remained under strict lockdown for most of the December quarter, with shoppers holding back on spending amid continued economic uncertainty. On an adjusted basis, the Beijing-based company earned 4.81 yuan per American depositary share in the reported quarter, compared with 2.21 yuan per share a year earlier.

☆ Alibaba and Ant venture to launch RISC-V chips for payments
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-02 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

The development comes as Chinese companies continue to invest heavily in chips, in the wake of U.S. export restrictions targeting China's semiconductor sector. Alibaba is one of several Chinese tech companies to pour research and development resources into RISC-V, an alternate chip architecture. The open-source nature of RISC-V's design in theory makes it less susceptible to export restrictions. In 2019, Washington imposed export restrictions on China's Huawei Technologies Co Ltd (HWT.UL), which threw the company's access to ARM designs in limbo. In late 2022, the United States launched similar export restrictions on Chinese chip fabs and research labs.

☆ Hedge funds unimpressed by Chinese internet giants' peppy earnings
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-28 | by ( Summer Zhen | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

HONG KONG, Feb 28 (Reuters) - A set of bumper earnings reports from the likes of Baidu Inc and other Chinese internet giants isn't impressing hedge funds and other investors who have cut exposure to the stocks and seem to be waiting for more good news. Despite easily beating expectations for their earnings and giving optimistic forecasts for the recovery in demand, shares in both companies fell. Mark Dong, co-founder of Minority Asset Management, who is based in Hong Kong, says expectations for Chinese growth are clouded by doubts over how Beijing plans to stimulate the economy and deal with external risks. The internet sector index (.H11137) nearly doubled between late-October and January but has since fallen 20%. Global hedge funds such as Bridgewater Associates, Tiger Asset Management and Coatue Management are big holders of China internet stocks, which makes the sector more vulnerable to the global economic cycle and geopolitical tensions.

☆ Ant Group quarterly net profit plunges by 82.7% -Alibaba filing
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-23 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: 1 min

SHANGHAI, Feb 23 (Reuters) - China's Ant Group on Thursday made net profit of 3.05 billion yuan ($442.13 million) in the three months to Sept. 30, down 82.7% from a year earlier, according to Reuters calculations from Alibaba Group Holding's earnings report. The e-commerce giant reports profit from Ant one quarter in arrears. ($1 = 6.8985 Chinese yuan renminbi)Reporting by Josh Horwitz Editing by David GoodmanOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ Alibaba beats quarterly revenue estimates as COVID curbs ease
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-23 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

Feb 23 (Reuters) - Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (9988.HK) reported better-than-expected quarterly revenue on Thursday, as the Chinese e-commerce giant benefited from the country easing COVID-19 curbs. The company has weathered a weak economy in China, which only last December lifted its zero-Covid policy after three years. Revenue rose 2% to 247.76 billion yuan ($35.92 billion) for the three months ended Dec. 31, compared with a Refinitiv consensus estimate of 245.18 billion yuan drawn from 23 analysts. Net income attributable to ordinary shareholders was 46.82 billion yuan, up from 27.69 billion yuan in the same quarter one year ago. ($1 = 6.8985 Chinese yuan renminbi)Reporting by Eva Mathews in Bengaluru and Josh Horwitz in Shanghai; Editing by Sriraj KalluvilaOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ Alibaba Sales Take a Hit From China’s Covid-19 Measures
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-23 | by ( Shen Lu | Yoko Kubota | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Alibaba’s quarterly revenue rose 2% from a year earlier. Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. reported lackluster sales growth in the October-December quarter, highlighting the financial toll of Beijing’s heavy-handed Covid-control regime and pressure from competition. Chief Executive Daniel Zhang on a call with analysts said he sees 2023 as a year of progress for the company, which is also emerging from a two-year regulatory crackdown.

☆ ChatGPT Fever Sweeps China as Tech Firms Seek Growth
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-22 | by ( Karen Hao | Shen Lu | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

The viral popularity of ChatGPT has stirred a frenzy within China where tech companies, battered by a two-year regulatory clampdown and the Covid-19 pandemic, have been seeking new sources of growth. Search engine owner Baidu Inc., e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. and social-media conglomerate Tencent Holdings Ltd. are among those that have announced investments to develop their own equivalents to the artificial-intelligence chatbot, which isn’t available in China. Stocks of other Chinese companies have surged in recent weeks as they have jumped on the bandwagon, triggering state media to issue a warning about the speculative rally.

SYDNEY/HONG KONG, Feb 20 (Reuters) - New rules laying out how Chinese companies can list outside mainland China will often mean getting a nod from several domestic government agencies, potentially making for a lengthy approval process, investment bankers say. On one hand, the rules provide clarity after a regulatory crackdown by Beijing since mid-2021 that has slowed U.S. listings by Chinese firms to a trickle. Those hoops, combined with U.S.-Sino tensions over a multitude of issues from suspected spy balloons to trade friction, means a rush of Chinese firms seeking initial public offerings in New York is unlikely. Last year, U.S. listings of Chinese firms were worth less than $230 million, according to Refinitiv data, a massive drop from $12.9 billion in 2021. "I don't think an overseas listing for the start-up would get the Chinese regulatory nod due to data security.

☆ American Cloud Companies Face Challenge From China in Southeast Asia
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-13 | by ( Raffaele Huang | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

China’s Alibaba Cloud has pledged a new investment of $1 billion to support its global partners in the coming three years. SINGAPORE—U.S. cloud-computing companies, dominant globally, are facing intensifying competition from upstart Chinese rivals in Southeast Asia, offering a head-to-head look at how the two geopolitical rivals’ corporate champions stack up in a key technology. China’s Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., Huawei Technologies Co. and Tencent Holdings Ltd. are planning to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in Southeast Asia in the coming years.

☆ Amazon, Microsoft, Google Pressured by Chinese Cloud Rivals in Southeast Asia
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-13 | by ( Raffaele Huang | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

☆ SoftBank tumbles to loss as Vision Fund in red for fourth straight quarter
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-07 | by ( Kiyoshi Takenaka | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

The Vision Fund, which upended the world of technology with its big bets on startups, reported an investment loss of 730.36 billion yen ($5.52 billion) in the fiscal third quarter. At SoftBank itself, the net loss totalled 783.42 billion yen, compared with a 29.05 billion yen profit a year earlier. SoftBank said the Vision Fund unit had significantly curtailed new investments and was continuing to sell some older ones as part of "prudent defensive financial management" amid the challenging market environment. GOOD ARMThe bulk of the loss at the Vision Fund unit came from a steep decline in the valuation of investments in unlisted companies. Son invested heavily in artificial intelligence and other high-tech startups through the Vision Fund in recent years, delivering both record profits and heady optimism about future valuations.

☆ SoftBank posts loss as Vision Fund in the red for fourth straight quarter
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-07 | by ( Kiyoshi Takenaka | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

TOKYO, Feb 7 (Reuters) - SoftBank Group Corp (9984.T) on Tuesday booked a net loss for October-December, as its giant Vision Fund investment unit remained in the red for a fourth straight quarter while a global tech sell-off battered valuations of its portfolio companies. The Vision Fund, which upended the world of technology with its big bets on startups, reported an investment loss of 730.36 billion yen ($5.52 billion) in the latest quarter. At SoftBank itself, the net loss totalled 783.42 billion yen, compared with a 29.05 billion yen profit a year earlier. SoftBank said the Vision Fund unit had significantly curtailed new investments and was continuing to sell some older ones as part of "prudent defensive financial management" amid the challenging market environment. The bulk of the loss at the Vision Fund unit came from a steep decline in the valuation of investments in unlisted companies.

Government bonds, which typically perform well when there is a dash for safe havens, sold off under intense pressure. The dollar rose to an almost one-month high of 132.85 yen while the euro fell 0.64% to $1.0726. Chinese equities fell on Monday, while the offshore yuan touched a one-month low against the dollar. European Central Bank and Bank of England policymakers will also be making appearances. Gold edged higher, with investors banking on the precious metal's safe-haven appeal as concerns about an economic slowdown linger.

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