Investment magnate Ron Baron has increased his stake in Alibaba. (Photo : Twitter)
Mutual funds magnate and financial guru Ron Baron is seeking to get a larger stake in Chinese Internet giant Alibaba with new shares purchases.
Baron's BaronAA has already purchased 816,738 Alibaba shares, priced at $78.27 per share, Yahoo reported. The e-commerce service provider's stock price has already risen by as much as 22 percent since it began its public offering.
The investor reportedly has $19 billion worth of assets that he has invested in several major companies, including the Chinese online shopping giant.
Alibaba has been considered by analysts as a hot pick in the stock market in the last few weeks. The company has listed an enterprise value of $205.69 billion, with a market cap of $202.57 billion. It currently has a price-earnings ratio of 32.57 and a price-book ratio of 6.99, indicating a positive outlook for investors.
Furthermore, Jack Ma's company has a 9 of 10 profitability rating, according to GuruFocus, a website that tracks the stock purchases and transactions made by major investors. It is currently operating at a margin of 29 percent with a return on equity of 23.33 percent and return on assets of 13.77 percent.
Meanwhile, Alibaba is continuously expanding its reaches outside of China, acquiring several companies from all over Asia, with its latest target being ShopClues, an Indian online marketplace.
The two parties have already held talks for a potential acquisition. Alibaba reportedly wants to get ShopClues, which is valued at around #1 billion, to merge it with Paytm, another Indian online marketplace service that Alibaba has stakes in, to create a major Indian competitor for Amazon, the Times of India reported.
The talks come after rumors of Alibaba also planning to purchase Indian online shopping website FlipKart as part of its effort to penetrate the country's online market. The company has yet to confirm the rumor. Meanwhile, ShopClues refused to comment on the report.
