Alibaba Tops Wall Street Views; To Invest In PT Tokopedia

Alibaba, the Chinese eCommerce giant, reported fiscal first quarter results that surpassed Wall Street’s expectations.

Earlier Thursday (Aug. 17) the company announced news that its revenue increased 56 percent year over year to 50.1 billion yuan, or $7.51 billion. Wall Street analysts had been looking for the eCommerce company to weigh in with revenue of 47.7 billion yuan. Net income for the three-month period which ended in June almost doubled to $2.17 billion, or $0.83 per share.

“Our technology is driving significant growth across our business and strengthening our position beyond core commerce,” Chief Executive Daniel Zhang said in a prepared statement. Alibaba said that its core commerce revenue jumped 58 percent, cloud computing revenue rose 96 percent and revenue from its digital media unit increased 30 percent. Annual active consumers on its eCommerce platforms grew by 12 million compared to last year’s fiscal first quarter, while mobile monthly active users hit 529 million in June, an increase of 22 million compared to last year’s fiscal first quarter.

According to The Wall Street Journal, Alibaba Chief Financial Officer Maggie Wu said the company will increase its investments during the second half of this year in an effort to boost its market share in the business-to-consumer market.

Separately, the Chinese eCommerce giant announced it would make an investment in PT Tokopedia, the Indonesian online marketplace that connects small businesses with consumers. PT Tokopedia is raising $1.1 billion, and Alibaba will have a minority stake in the company. The Indonesian investment on the part of Alibaba comes just a little more than a month after Amazon is getting in the Southeast Asian market, which is home to more than 600 million consumers. Alibaba has already invested $1 billion to increase its position in Lazada, the online retailer in Southeast Asia.