Alibaba’s Latest Singles Day Returns Smash Last Year’s Records
We recently heard that this year’s Singles Day in China was poised to be big business as a horde of lonely hearts went forth to buy stuff for themselves. Indeed, it was a monster day, as Alibaba Group Holding revealed its own returns were up 39 percent from just 2016, giving it the biggest year yet and prompting some to wonder when this particular gravy train would get derailed.
Alibaba’s e-commerce operations saw a whopping $25.3 billion in gross merchandise go through its systems this year, a number up, as noted previously, 39 percent from last year. Of particular interest to us, meanwhile, is that 90 percent of that total was settled through Alibaba’s mobile payments unit. That too is up, as in 2016, a meager, anemic 82 percent of gross volume was settled through Alipay operations.
The Singles Day event brought over 140,000 merchants and brands alike together, which gave single shoppers plenty to choose from. Throw in the fact that Alipay processed just shy of a billion and a half total transactions in that time—itself a number up 41 percent from last year’s shopping bacchanal—and you’ll see just what’s at stake here.
Of course, it’s important to point out here that there were some changes in return policies and the like that cast a bit of a pallor on this year’s numbers, but even with some minor modifications to the returns in producing a more level playing field, the end result is still one for the record books. There’s one point that sticks out here; Singles Day has been showing regular growth for the last few years, but we all know that nothing can grow forever. Eventually—if there’s any kind of honesty in these figures—eventually there will be a downturn. If there isn’t, the entire reporting system will be called into question; it has to buckle someday.
For now, however, the Chinese consumer is clearly enamored with mobile payments and online shopping, and there’s nothing much to suggest that trend can’t carry on for some time. With a slate of new brands and merchants added in an attempt to tap the Chinese market, any reversal of fortune may not come for some time, a development that will leave Alipay laughing all the way to the bank.