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 Among the institutional investors that dissolved their stake were
Leon Cooperman's Omega Advisors, David Tepper's Appaloosa Management
and Barry Rosenstein's Jana Partners LLC, according to U.S.
regulatory filings released late Friday and Tuesday. Tiger
Management, Moore Capital Management and Viking Global Investors LP
decreased their stakes from the prior quarter, according to the
filings.
Dan Loeb's Third Point and John Paulson's Paulson & Co bucked the
trend, increasing their stakes in the Chinese e-commerce giant,
while Tiger Global Management was also an anomaly, jumping in and
taking a 5.8 million-share stake.
Soros Fund Management Group, the hedge fund firm founded by
billionaire George Soros, kept its stake unchanged at 4.4 million
shares.
The changes come just months after the hedge fund managers piled
into Alibaba following its record $25 billion initial public
offering in September. The red hot IPO attracted big purchases from
investors eager to gain exposure to a company often referred to as
the "Amazon of China."
The shares soared to a high of $120 in November, but have tumbled
since then, dropping about 27.6 percent to their close of $86.85 on
the New York Stock Exchange on Tuesday. Alibaba shares, which opened
at $92.70 at their market debut on Sept. 19, took a sharp drop last
month after the company reported lower-than-expected revenues for
the third quarter.
Among those who unloaded shares from their previous positions: Tiger
Management, led by Julian Robertson, decreased its position by 53
percent to 571,183 shares at the end of last year, from 1.2 million
shares in the prior quarter. Louis Bacon's Moore Capital Management
decreased its stake by 91 percent to 138,345 shares from 1.52
million; and Viking Global Investors LP decreased its stake by 67.5
percent to 3.7 million shares from 11.4 million shares.
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Third Point increased its stake by 38.9 percent to 10 million shares
at the end of December, from 7.2 million shares at the end of
September, while Paulson nudged up its stake by 1.2 percent to 1.93
million shares from 1.9 million shares.
Even as appetite sours among several of the biggest investors, some
remain optimistic about the long-term potential of the e-commerce
giant. Mark Yusko, head of the $4 billion Morgan Creek Capital
Management, told Reuters in January that he sees Alibaba as a
"dominant franchise," able to capitalize on China's growing consumer
market.
U.S. regulators require large investors to disclose their stock
holdings every quarter, providing a window into the strategies of
some of the biggest hedge fund managers for buying and selling
stocks.
The disclosures known as 13F filings, which came out on Friday and
Tuesday, show manager holdings as of the end of the fourth quarter.
(Reporting by Ashley Lau in New York; Editing by Jennifer Ablan and
Lisa Shumaker)
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