A rerun of the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis? HSBC's chief economist sees significant similarities

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The 1997 Asian financial crisis culminated in recessions in economies throughout the region, amid market turmoil characterized by currency collapse, capital flight and banking failures. Now, Asia's financial environment bears some striking similarities to the period immediately before the crisis, according to HSBC's chief economist Frederick Neumann. Surging U.S. bond yields, a weak Japanese yen and tech optimism dominated the financial environment in the lead-up to the crisis, Neumann wrote in an Aug. 31 note. Neumann highlighted elevated U.S. Treasury yields as a key similarity with the period before the 1997 crisis. U.S. Benchmark 10-year bonds , for example, climbed from 5% in October 1993 to around 8% in November 1994. Even in April 1997, yields were at about 7%, some 200 basis points above where they had been four years prior, Neumann noted. Today, 10-year Treasury bond yields have climbed from a low of 0.5% in August 2020 to around 4.79% early Tuesday. "Granted, th...

Alibaba’s Chairman Just Bought Shares After a Major AI Funding Deal. How Investors Should View the Move.

Alibaba’s Chairman Just Bought Shares After a Major AI Funding Deal. How Investors Should View the Move. Ebube Jones Sun, August 30, 2026 at 10:30 AM PDT 6 min read BABA Buy enter button by Ardasavasciogullari via iStock Alibaba Group (BABA) reported a 75% drop in quarterly profit on Aug. 20 as it spent more on AI infrastructure. Even so, revenue rose 9% to nearly $40 billion, while its AI Cloud and Compute Services revenue jumped 45% to $7.2 billion. Three days later, Alibaba raised $10.2 billion by issuing 710 million new shares at HK$112.70 each. The price was 8.4% below the prior close, diluting existing shareholders by about 3.6%. Investors pushed BABA stock lower as they weighed the cost of the company's AI plans. More News from Barchart Wu-Tang Clan Member Raekwon Is a Palantir 'OG,' Visiting Headquarters 16 Years After Receiving His Custom PLTR Jacket Tesla Stock Could Benefit as Trump Locks Down the U.S. Power Grid Tesla Just Killed Its Solar Roof After Years of Struggling to Scale. What It Means for TSLA Stock. Stop Missing Market Moves: Get the FREE Barchart Brief your midday dose of stock movers, trending sectors, and actionable trade ideas, delivered right to your inbox. Sign Up Now! Then Chairman Joseph Tsai bought about $10.3 million of Alibaba shares, while CEO Eddie Wu bought roughly $5 million. Both purchases were made close to the new-share issue price and appear to be their first major reported open-market buys. In other words, shortly after asking shareholders to accept dilution, the two executives put their own money into the stock at nearly the same price. Alibaba is already investing more than $50 billion in AI infrastructure over three years, and management believes the spending could pay off within 2.5 years. So, should investors see these insider purchases as a sign of confidence in that plan? Let's take a closer look. Alibaba's Financial Progress Alibaba Group Holding runs China's largest online shopping platform and also operates cloud computing, logistics, overseas retail, and local services businesses. BABA stock is down about 1% over the past 52 weeks and 19% so far this year. www.barchart.com It trades at 18.9x forward earnings, above the sector average of 16.08x. The company also pays an annual dividend of $1.03 per share, which works out to a 0.86% yield. Its latest dividend payment was on June 11, 2026. Alibaba pays the dividend once a year, has raised it for one year, and has a forward payout ratio of 43.45%. The latest quarter shows both the opportunity and the cost of Alibaba's AI push. Revenue rose 9% YoY to RMB268.95 billion, or $39.64 billion. Customer-management revenue fell 7%, though it would have risen 1% without the impact of contra revenue tied to a new-business-development program. Profit fell sharply as spending increased: operating income dropped 57% to RMB15.16 billion, adjusted EBITA fell 30% to RMB27.33 billion, and net income sank 75% to RMB10.44 billion. Story Continues Non-GAAP net income declined 38% to RMB20.72 billion,...

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