The growth continues for China e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.
The behemoth said Thursday that its revenues for the quarter ending Dec. 31, 2015 accelerated 32 percent, to 34.5 billion yuan, or $5.3 billion. Sales for China retail marketplace advanced 35 percent year-over-year to 28.7 billion yuan, or $4.4 billion.
“Our proven ability to deliver an unparalleled consumer experience and to help merchants attract, engage and retain buyers will drive future growth in our core business,” said Daniel Zhang, CEO of Alibaba Group, in a release. “We remain focused on our top strategic priorities, including global imports, rural expansion, increasing our footprint in first-tier Chinese cities and building a world-class cloud computing business.”
Mobile commerce growth — which rose 192 percent to 18.7 billion yuan or $2.9 billion — Alibaba’s management noted, continues to be a top priority.
“We achieved impressive revenue growth as we are increasingly monetizing the user activity on our marketplaces, particularly on mobile devices,” said Alibaba CFO Maggie Wu in a release. “Meanwhile, we generated strong free cash flow of $3.7 billion this quarter. The fundamental strength of our core business gives us the confidence to invest in our strategic priorities.”
Alibaba also announced that it hit a milestone of over 400 million annual active buyers on its platforms, an increase of 21 percent from the previous quarter.
The company said its gross merchandise volume (GMV) — a measure of growth in the e-commerce space — increased 23 percent year-over-year, to 964 billion yuan, or $149 billion.
