by Casey Hall and Harshita Mary Varghese
SHANGHAI (Reuters) – Chinese group Alibaba Holding reported below-expected third-quarter revenue on Wednesday, hit by weak retail sales and a sluggish recovery in China.
Alibaba stock listed in the United States fell 3.79% in early trading despite the announcement of a $25 billion increase in the share buyback program until the end of March 2027.
The turnover of Alibaba’s two major online commerce platforms, Taobao and Tmall Group, increased by only 2% in the third quarter, a period which includes end-of-year celebrations such as Singles’ Day. and usually boosts sales.
Net profit fell 77% over the quarter, to 10.7 billion yuan (1.4 billion euros).
“Our top priority is to revive growth in our core businesses, e-commerce and cloud computing,” Alibaba Chief Executive Officer Eddie Wu said.
In a conference call, the executive said he sees early signs of a recovery in Taobao and Tmall’s gross merchandise volume (GMV).
“Our strategy is focused on increasing purchase frequency. If we can do that, we will achieve better GMV growth,” Wu said.
The e-commerce giant announced in March that it planned to divide its activities into six main units as part of its biggest restructuring in its 24-year history.
In November, it finally abandoned its plan to spin off its cloud computing business, citing uncertainties created by US restrictions on the export of chips for artificial intelligence (AI).
(Reporting by Harshita Varghese, Savyata Mishra and Casey Hall, Blandine Hénault for the French version)
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