BABA Stock Rallies After Record-Breaking Shopping Festival

Alibaba just announced that its "6.18 Mid-Year Shopping Festival" broke records across China

The shares of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (NYSE:BABA) are popping this morning, after the Chinese e-commerce giant announced that its "6.18 Mid-Year Shopping Festival" broke sales records across China. The event, which took place over 18 days and featured over 200,000 brands, helpedmany of the participating companies achieve new all-time sales records. The stock has climbed 3.1% to $170.50, set for its highest close in weeks.

In fact, since hitting a four-month low of $149.26 at the end of May, BABA has managed to tack on roughly 14.2%. What's more, the equity is trading back atop its 40-day moving average -- which has served as recent pressure on the charts -- for the first time in over a month. Plus, the equity just reclaimed the bear gap it suffered in mid-May.

Despite the recent dip,sentiment over BABA is largely optimistic, with 20 of the 23 analysts in coverage calling it a "strong buy," and only one saying "hold." Plus, the consensus 12-month target price of $217.21 represents an untouched region for the security, and sits at a 31.3% premium to last night's close.

Shorts, however, have been upping the bearish ante, with a 6.9% surge in the last two reporting periods. The 116.52 million shares sold short represent 4.6% of the stock's available float, and would take about seven days to cover at BABA's average pace of trading. Should some of these shorts start to unwind, more tailwinds could help propel the stock higher.