Despite Price Dip, Wall Street Still Likes Alibaba

Despite losses of 23 percent so far this year, Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (NYSE: BABA) remains a Wall Street darling.

Analysts on average rate the Chinese Internet giant a Buy, with an average price target of $106.97 a share.

Alibaba, set to post first quarter earnings Thursday, closed Tuesday at $79.54, off 1.3 percent and near an all-time low.

The company closed on its first day of trading in September 2014 at $93.89 in a $25 billion initial public offering.

Among 39 analysts polled by FactSet, 34 rate Alibaba at Buy, three are at Hold and two are at Overweight.

Tipranks, which says it ranks more than 6,500 analysts based on their success rate, tracks 17 analysts following Alibaba and all rate the stock a Buy.

Alibaba analysts rated tops by Tiprank include Deutsche Bank's Alan Hellawell, RBC's Mark Mahaney, Cantor Fitzgerald's Youseff Squali, J.P. Morgan's Doug Anmuth and Stifel's Scott Devitt.

Wall Street expects the company will post adjusted first-quarter earnings of $0.42 a share, on revenue of $2.78 billion.

Alibaba Chairman Jack Ma last week reportedly imposed a hiring freeze and warned that the company has grown too rapidly.

Baidu Inc (ADR) (NASDAQ: BIDU), the Chinese Internet search provider, last week missed quarterly expectations on slowing revenue growth and a decline in profits.