Alibaba is touting early sales after withholding data last year, a sign of brighter prospects

Alibaba Group Holding and other e-commerce operators released encouraging early sales figures for their 618 promotions mid-year – China’s biggest shopping season after Singles’ Day and a driver of consumer sentiment in the world’s second-largest economy.

Four hours after Alibaba’s Taobao and Tmall marketplaces began selling at 8 p.m. on Monday, the gross merchandise value (GMV) of each of the 59 brands exceeded 100 million yuan ($13.8 million), while 376 products’ GMV exceeded 10 million yuan, Alibaba’s domestic e-commerce division said on Tuesday.

Apple, which is offering a new round of steep discounts on its iPhone 15 models in mainland China, sold more than 1.5 billion yuan worth of products on Alibaba’s platforms an hour after the event started, outpacing its Chinese rivals, according to Taobao and Tmall. .

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The platforms reported that about 370,000 small businesses more than doubled their GMV on the first day of sales compared to last year. Alibaba owns the South China Morning Post.

618 Alibaba shopping event advertisement. Photo: Bloomberg alt=Advertisement for 618 Alibaba shopping event. Photo: Bloomberg>

The positive sales figures posted by the e-commerce giant, which reported better-than-expected quarterly revenue last week, came despite signs of slowing consumer spending in China.

Domestic retail sales, a key indicator of consumption, rose just 2.3% year-on-year in April, lower than the 3.1% recorded in March and the 5.5% in the combined January and February period.

Still, in recent months, global investment banks and brokers have reduced their skepticism about China’s economic growth prospects. The e-commerce market in particular has the potential to continue to grow in the coming years even as offline retail activity in the country remains uncertain, a JPMorgan senior analyst told the Post last week.

After a relatively quiet 618 event last year, when major e-commerce players held back GMV numbers due to the difficult economic situation, companies are doing everything they can to attract customers this year.

Tech giants Alibaba and JD.com, as well as smaller players like Kuaishou, this time skipped the pre-sale period, which in previous years allowed consumers to place a deposit on an item they wanted to buy to guarantee a low price during the actual sale period.

Instead, the platforms are already showering shoppers with steep discounts in the weeks leading up to June 18, the big sale day that gives the shopping event its name.

Xiaohongshu, the Instagram-like social media platform in China that launched its second-ever 618 shopping festival on Tuesday, said that on the first day GMV from its livestreamed sessions increased sixfold from last year, while the number of orders increased more than eight times.

The platform, also known as Little Red Book and allowing users to post content related to topics such as fashion and travel, is relying on live broadcasts by sellers and online influencers to gain a foothold in China’s e-commerce market.

Pinduoduo, the bargain e-commerce platform run by PDD Holdings, started selling 618 units on Sunday but has not yet released any numbers. JD.com sales will begin on May 31.

This article originally appeared on the South China Morning Post (SCMP), the most authoritative newspaper reporting on China and Asia for over a century. For more SCMP stories, visit the SCMP app or follow SCMP i on Facebook Twitter pages. Copyright © 2024 South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.