The shares of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. jumped broadly over the weekend after the firm displayed a record- shattering performance on China’s Single’s Day, the country’s biggest online shopping bonanza, as it surpassed its last year’s output, breaching past the $20 billion-mark.
Alibaba shares registered 1.30% advancement on the day of the world’s largest shopping event and settled at $186.41 per share, buoyed by strong sales that smashed the company’s record on the previous year.
At the end of the extravaganza, the e-commerce giant, Alibaba, chalked up total sales of a whopping $25.4 billion after tallying $1 billion in just two minutes and $10 billion in more than an hour. That was a 39% increase from last year’s sales, which amounted to 120.7 billion in Chinese yuan.
The online shopping was swarmed with pre-orders as stars graced the event in Shanghai to promote the Single’s Day and through the halfway mark, Alibaba was already near the $18-billion level as consumers flocked to a plethora of discounts and bargains.
Single’s Day, an event which was once dedicated for lonely hearts in China, has become an important piece to Chinese economy and major e-commerce firms such like Alibaba as it provides a big boost to the country’s consumption.
In the past years, Single’s Day’s online shopping event has been outperforming its US and UK counterparts, the Black Friday and Cyber Monday, which are also a time for shoppers to enjoy discounted items.