Jim Chanos Says He's `Moved On' From His Bet Against Alibaba

(Bloomberg) -- Jim Chanos is done betting against e-commerce company Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., for now at least.

“We covered in January,” Chanos, who founded hedge fund firm Kynikos Associates, said in an interview Tuesday on CNBC. “I do have problems with Alibaba’s accounting, I still have problems with Alibaba’s accounting, but for the time being we’ve moved on.”

The famed short-seller says his views on the company changed earlier this year when Sullivan & Cromwell partner Jay Clayton was nominated to run the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Clayton counts Alibaba among his clients, having worked on its record $25 billion share sale in 2014.

Chanos, who predicted the 2001 collapse of Enron Corp., had been shorting Alibaba since November 2015 on the back of accounting and disclosure concerns. Since then, the company’s New York-listed shares have more than doubled in price -- with most of those gains made this year.