Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (NYSE:BABA) on Monday raked in a record $31 billion in sales during China’s annual Singles Day online shopping blitz.
The country's biggest e-commerce company topped last year's record in 16-and-a-half hours.
Alibaba turned China’s informal Singles’ Day into a shopping event in 2009 and built it into the world’s biggest online sales fest, dwarfing Cyber Monday in the US which took in $7.9 billion last year. The name is a play on the date, November 11, rendered 11/11 - or Double Eleven, as the event is also known.
The 24-hour event comes as Alibaba’s growth is under pressure from China’s slowing economy and the trade war with the US.
Alibaba plans $15 billion shares sale in Hong Kong
"Singles Day is being held up as a bellwether of Chinese consumers' willingness to spend in the face of a domestic slowdown," wrote Jeffrey Halley, senior market analyst for Asia Pacific at Oanda, in a note Monday. But "deeply discounting prices always brings consumers out to play, no matter how bad the economy might be," he added.
Singles Day also is used as a gauge of Chinese consumer sentiment, has also become a shop window this year for Alibaba as the firm plans to sell $15 billion worth of shares in Hong Kong this month.
The US-listed firm has spent big to diversify its business, yet still earns over four-fifths of revenue from e-commerce.
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