Alibaba sees 2021 sales topping US$91 billion on back of China recovery, more enterprises going digital
- The Chinese e-commerce giant beat estimates to post a 22 per cent increase in revenue to US$16.1 billion in the March quarter, despite the coronavirus disruptions
- The Hangzhou-based company reached a historic milestone of US$1 trillion in gross merchandise value during the year ended March 31
Alibaba Group Holding said it expects revenue for the 12 months to March 31 2021 to reach more than 650 billion yuan (US$91.1 billion), as China’s domestic consumption recovers from the disruption caused by the coronavirus pandemic and more enterprises adopt digital operations.
The Hangzhou-based e-commerce giant, however, indicated that ongoing tensions between the US and China added more uncertainty to the post-coronavirus world.
The company on Friday reported a 22 per cent increase in revenue for the March quarter, receiving a boost from more people shopping online amid the lockdowns across China and greater demand from businesses for its cloud computing services.
“Despite the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, Alibaba achieved the historical milestone of US$1 trillion in GMV across our digital economy this fiscal year, a strategic goal that we set for ourselves five years ago,” said Daniel Zhang Yong, chairman and chief executive of Alibaba, in a conference call with analysts on Friday after the close of Hong Kong trading. GMV stands for gross merchandise value, a measure of sales.
That put Alibaba’s scale to about one-sixth of China’s total retail sales, which was around US$6 trillion last year, according to Zhang. “We are very confident that in the new fiscal year we’ll achieve another net add of at least 1 trillion yuan GMV from our China retail marketplaces,” he said.
