Alibaba's quarterly revenue beats estimates

[BEIJING] Alibaba Group Holding Ltd, China's largest e-commerce firm, reported first-quarter revenue above Wall Street estimates, helped by strength in the Chinese e-commerce market.

Alibaba's revenue rose 56 per cent to 50.18 billion yuan (S$10.25 billion) for the three months ended June 30, compared with the analysts' average estimate of 47.7 billion yuan, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

Revenue from the core e-commerce business rose 58 per cent, just shy of the 59.5 per cent jump in the previous quarter.

Alibaba - one of the most valuable companies in Asia - is benefiting from more Chinese consumers buying an increasing proportion of everything from food to clothing to luxury items online.

The company's cloud computing and entertainment businesses also fared well but investments in offline stores are yet to pay off.

Net income attributable to the company's shareholders nearly doubled to US$2.17 billion, or 83 US cents per share.

REUTERS