China's JD.com makes Wall Street splash

New York - Chinese online retailer JD.com rallied Thursday in its Wall Street debut, suggesting an appetite for its larger rival Alibaba.

The company, trading under the symbol JD on the Nasdaq exchange, jumped 10.5% to $21 from its initial public offering price of $19.

The retailer, number two in the online space behind Alibaba, raised $1.78bn in the IPO, making it the third largest of the year after Ally Financial and Santander Consumer USA, according to Renaissance Capital.

The new IPO price "places a value of about $26bn on JD.com, far below the value of $153bn assigned to Alibaba back in February, but impressive nevertheless," said Paul Ausick at 24/7 Wall Street.

"The company faces formidable competition from both Alibaba's Taobao.com and Amazon.com Inc. JD.com has a deal with China's other big online retailer, Tencent Holdings, that gives the company prominent access to Tencent's mobile chat and messaging apps."

Alibaba has filed papers for its IPO, expected to be one of the largest in history, but has for the time being left out key details and financial data. Some analysts expect it to raise $15bn.