Alibaba’s Annual Active Consumers On China Marketplaces Hit 742M

Alibaba Group Holding Co. reported results on Thursday (Aug. 20) that suggested that the company benefited from the digital shift that has been quickened by the pandemic.

Alibaba Group Chairman and CEO Daniel Zhang said in a press release that the company was “well positioned to capture growth from the ongoing digital transformation, which has been accelerated by the pandemic, in both consumption and enterprise operations.”

“We mobilized our entire digital infrastructure to support the economic recovery of businesses across a wide range of sectors, while broadening and diversifying our consumer base by addressing their changing preferences in a post-COVID-19 environment,” Zhang said.

The firm reported annual active consumers on its China retail marketplaces hit 742 million in the quarter concluding June 30 compared to 674 million for the same quarter in 2019, marking an approximately 10 percent increase.

Mobile monthly active users (MAUs) on the platform’s China retail marketplaces hit 874 million in June compared to 755 million for the same quarter in 2019, marking an approximately 16 percent increase.

“Our domestic core commerce business has fully recovered to pre-COVID-19 levels across the board, while cloud computing revenue grew 59 percent year over year,” Alibaba Chief Financial Officer Maggie Wu said in the release. “Our strong profit growth and cash flow enable us to continue to strengthen our core business and invest for long-term growth.”

As for its overall results, Alibaba reported non-GAAP net income of $5.6 billion (non-GAAP diluted earnings per ADS of $2.10) on revenue of $21.8 billion. The results surpassed analyst estimates of $1.99 earnings per share on $21.34 billion in revenue.

Zhang said on a call with analysts on Thursday (Aug. 20) that the company provided “another strong quarter.”

“Although the global community continues to struggle with uncertainties surrounding the pandemic, we have seen encouraging signs of recovery in China due to effective management of the outbreak in [the] vast majority of the country,” Zhang said on the call.

The news comes as Ant Group reported $1.3 billion in profits in the first fiscal year quarter, up 560 percent from the same timeframe a year ago.

Ant Group contributed earnings of $433.7 million for Alibaba Group Holding, which is its parent company and has one-third ownership in Ant.