Alibaba becomes Asia's most valuable company, surpassing Tencent

Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba has surpassed its main domestic rival Tencent to become the most valuable company in Asia.

Alibaba’s share price bounced 13 percent to a record US$142.30 on the New York Stock Exchange on Thursday, boosting its market valuation to US$362.3 billion and surpassing Tencent’s US$332.3 billion.

The share price jump followed an investor conference in Hangzhou where Alibaba chief financial officer Maggie Wu said the company expected its revenue to grow between 45 to 49 percent in the 2018 financial year, beating every analyst’s estimates.

Headed by founder Jack Ma, Alibaba operates popular e-commerce platforms including Taobao and Tmall, which are used by hundreds of millions of Chinese for selling and buying everything from electronics to food.

The company said on Thursday that the overall value of goods sold through its online shopping platforms could reach US$1 trillion in 2020, almost doubling from US$547 billion in the fiscal year ending in March.

Alibaba has recently expanded its business into new verticals like entertainment, media and cloud computing, putting it into rivalry with internet and gaming giant Tencent which runs popular Chinese messaging platform Wechat.

Meanwhile, the positive revenue forecast boosted Jack Ma’s net worth by US$2.8 billion overnight into $41.8 billion, making him the richest man in Asia and 14th richest in the world, according to Bloomberg.

Ma is expected to discuss his company’s initiatives on Friday.

(GBTIMES)