Alibaba Group revenue up but profit down

Alibaba Group revenue jumped 56 per cent to RMB158.27 billion (US$22.96 billion) for its latest fiscal year, even as net income fell 42 per cent to RMB41.23 billion.

The company attributes the fall to a larger tax bill plus investments in cloud computing.

Fourth-quarter sales to the end of March rose for the seventh consecutive quarter to RMB38.58 billion, while net income jumped 85 per cent to RMB9.85 billion.

CEO Daniel Zhang says the outstanding results demonstrate the company’s ability to engage and monetise the half a billion consumers across its platforms.

“Our core commerce segment continued its significant growth and strong cash flow at large scale, enabling our aggressive investment in cloud computing, digital media and entertainment.”

Revenue growth for the quarter accelerated to 60 per cent, the highest rate since the group’s IPO.

Highlights for the quarter:

  • 47 per cent increase in revenue from core commerce to RMB31.570 billion.
  • 103 per cent jump in revenue from cloud computing to RMB2.163 billion.
  • 234 per cent leap in revenue from digital media and entertainment to RMB3.927 billion.
  • 88 per cent growth in revenue from innovation initiatives to RMB919 million.
  • 14 million increase in marketplace mobile monthly active users to 507 million.
  • 874,000 cloud-computing clients, up from 765,000.

Highlights for the year:

  • 11 million increase in active buyers to 454 million
  • 45 per cent increase in core commerce revenue to RMB133.880 billion.
  • 121 per cent jump in cloud-computing revenue to RMB6.663 billion.
  • 271 per cent leap in revenue from digital media and entertainment to RMB14.733 billion.
  • 65 per cent growth in innovative-initiative revenue to RMB2.997 billion.
  • 97 million more mobile monthly active users to 507 million.
  • 80 per cent growth in mobile revenue from China retail business to RMB90.731 billion (80 per cent of total China retail revenue).
  • 513,000 more cloud-computing clients to reach 874,000.

Alibaba says its international consumer platform AliExpress and Lazada achieved 83 million annual active buyers combined for the year. AliExpress has 16 local-language sites, including French, Russian and Spanish.
During the quarter, Alibaba worked with government agencies to launch an e-hub for trade clearance and logistics in Malaysia under its Electronic World Trade Platform (eWTP) initiative to enable cross-border trade between China and Southeast Asian countries.

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