Alibaba pops, but the earnings print was messy

The market gave Alibaba a thumbs-up anyway

Alibaba came out swinging with fiscal fourth-quarter 2026 results, and the stock still managed to rip about 6% higher. That’s because revenue landed at $35.28 billion, slightly ahead of estimates, which is enough to keep the growth engine from sounding broken even if the rest of the report had some dents.

The bad news was pretty obvious

Adjusted earnings per ADS came in at just 9 cents, miles below the $1.12 analysts were expecting. In other words: the top line was doing enough to keep people interested, but the bottom line showed the kind of pressure that makes investors squint at their screens and ask, “Okay, so what exactly is the plan here?”

Why traders looked past the miss

There were a couple of reasons this wasn’t a total faceplant:

• Revenue rose 3% year over year, which at least says the business is still moving forward.
• Excluding Sun Art and Intime, revenue was up 11% on a like-for-like basis, a cleaner view of the core business.
• The stock reaction suggests traders are still betting on Alibaba’s cloud and commerce mix rather than obsessing over one ugly EPS line.

Big picture: the growth story still has legs

For investors, this is classic “good enough to celebrate, bad enough to worry later.” Alibaba didn’t deliver a flawless earnings beat, but it showed enough underlying strength that buyers stepped in anyway. If you’re holding the stock, the message is pretty simple: the market still cares more about the long game than one messy quarter.