Alibaba shares drop 3% on Malaysia data centre allegations

Written by Falling Shares Intelligence, our automated newsroom, from the public sources listed below and live market data. Every figure is checked against that material before publication, but the story has not been reviewed by a human editor. Check the linked sources before relying on it, and report errors to info@fallingshares.com.

Alibaba shares fell 3.06% on Tuesday, underperforming the Hang Seng Index which rose 0.4%, after anonymous claims linked the group to a data centre project under investigation in Malaysia.

Culper Research links firm to probe

Anonymous claims attributed to Culper Research suggest Alibaba may be connected to a data centre project involving Megaspeed, which is at the centre of a scandal in Malaysia. The allegations imply that Alibaba’s cloud arm, YTL AI Cloud, is involved in the disputed infrastructure work.

No official investigation or charge has been announced against Alibaba by Malaysian regulators. The reports have not been independently verified. The company did not provide a comment to the exchange or to media outlets requesting clarification.

Company-specific factors drive decline

Falling Shares attributes the stock’s 3.1% drop to company-specific factors, which contributed -3.8%, while the broader market contributed a 0.8% gain. The consumer cyclical internet retail sector held steady.

Alibaba’s shares are 41.6% below their 52-week high of 174.2 HKD. Over the past year, the stock has fallen 38.5%. The stock is rated Unstable by Falling Shares, with annualised volatility of 42.1% compared to 17.1% for the benchmark. There have been eight sessions with moves of 5% or more in the past six months.