Moonshot AI’s Kimi K3 jolts China AI stocks after benchmark gains
What's new: The 2.8 trillion-parameter model topped an AI coding leaderboard, while shares of Z.ai fell 28% and Alibaba slid 4%.
Chinese startup Moonshot AI released Kimi K3 on Friday, pitching the 2.8 trillion-parameter system as a lower-cost, open-source model that narrows the gap with top U.S. rivals. The company said K3 still trails Anthropic’s Claude Fable 5 and OpenAI’s GPT 5.6 Sol overall, but outperformed several other tested models on coding and agent benchmarks. Soon after launch, K3 moved to the top of Arena’s AI coding leaderboard and ranked ninth worldwide for text queries. The debut rippled through China’s AI sector: Z.ai shares dropped 28%, MiniMax fell 16% and Alibaba lost 4%, as investors weighed pressure on competing model makers. The release lands as Washington debates curbs on Chinese AI adoption and Beijing pushes for greater AI development and governance cooperation.