Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. is the most likely of six leading internet rivals to reach $1 trillion in market cap by 2020, MKM Partners analyst Rob Sanderson said Friday. That would put it ahead of the other five companies, namely Apple Inc. , Alphabet Inc. , Amazon.com Inc. , Facebook Inc. and Tencent , Sanderson wrote in a note. Apple is currently closest to $1 trillion and a case could be made for it to achieve that threshold by 2019, he wrote. “We think it’s most likely 2021 when the barrier is broken by an Internet company, but think BABA may have the best chance for 2020 despite being the smallest of the mega-caps today,” he wrote. To get there, the company would need to exceed the current earnings consensus by 20% in calendar year 2018, grow EPS by 45% in calendar year 2019, have an outlook for 40% growth for calendar year 2020 and maintain its 24 times forward price/equity ratio, he said. Alibaba shares have gained 96% in 2017, while the S&P 500 has gained 20%.
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