Alibaba makes a major push to topple Amazon

Stocks are struggling to keep the rally going in early trading. Meanwhile, investors are keeping an eye on Alibaba after the Chinese e-commerce giant boosts its research and development budget by $15 billion over the next three years. Yahoo Finance’s Alexis Christoforous, Jared Blikre, Justine Underhill and Rick Newman discuss the big stories of the day.

Today’s topics:

• Alibaba to pour $15B in R&D

• $3.1T in property at risk from CA wildfires: rpt

• Dow attempts its 48th record high today

• Delta jumps on beat, despite hurricane cancellations

• JetBlue predicts dismal Q3, Q4 results due to hurricanes

• BlackRock now manages $6T in assets

• SeaWorld sinks after Merlin abandons takeover talks

• Pres Trump to pitch new tax plan in PA today

• Instagram engagement climbs, Facebook’s tumbles: PiperJaffray

• Apple inks deal with Spielberg for ‘Amazing Stories’ reboot

TWITTER POLL:
Which social media platform is your favorite to interact with?
—Facebook
—Instagram
—Snapchat
—Twitter