Jack Ma praised a key rival. A day later, it overtook Alibaba as China's most valuable e-commerce company.

• Temu's parent company, PDD Holdings, is currently more valuable than Alibaba.
• PDD's market cap overtook Alibaba a day after Jack Ma praised the rival ecommerce upstart.
• PDD's market cap is nearly $185 billion, while Alibaba's market cap is nearly $184 billion.

Chinese tech giant Alibaba hasn't had the easiest time in the past three years.

Alibaba — and its larger-than-life cofounder, Jack Ma — dominated the Chinese e-commerce sector for over a decade.