--- title: "Alibaba Hides Its Annual Active User Count" description: "Alibaba Group released its Q1 FY2022 earnings (Q2 2021) on August 3, 2021. The company's annual active consumers in China retail reached 828 million, but this figure was buried in a footnote, drawing attention to the widening gap with Pinduoduo. Revenue grew 34% to RMB 205.74 billion, while strategic investments in new businesses led to a RMB 13.9 billion loss." author: "赵小米" publisher: "New Distribution" email: "zhaobo258@gmail.com" telephone: "+8615854817671" published: "2021-08-05" language: "en" canonical: "https://xinjignxiao.com/en/articles/alibaba-hides-its-annual-active-user-count-860047e0/" markdown: "https://xinjignxiao.com/en/articles/alibaba-hides-its-annual-active-user-count-860047e0.md" original_source: "https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/Et1tgoMKDqaMdrkH_41F7g" translation: "https://xinjignxiao.com/zh/articles/%E9%98%BF%E9%87%8C%E6%8A%8A%E5%B9%B4%E6%B4%BB%E7%94%A8%E6%88%B7%E6%95%B0-%E8%97%8F-%E8%B5%B7%E6%9D%A5%E4%BA%86-860047e0.md" attribution: "New Distribution — https://xinjignxiao.com/en/articles/alibaba-hides-its-annual-active-user-count-860047e0/" usage_policy: "https://xinjignxiao.com/ai-policy.txt" --- # Alibaba Hides Its Annual Active User Count > Alibaba Group released its Q1 FY2022 earnings (Q2 2021) on August 3, 2021. The company's annual active consumers in China retail reached 828 million, but this figure was buried in a footnote, drawing attention to the widening gap with Pinduoduo. Revenue grew 34% to RMB 205.74 billion, while strategic investments in new businesses led to a RMB 13.9 billion loss. Source: 36Kr - Future Consumption (WeChat ID: lslb168) Tonight (August 3), Alibaba Group released its earnings for the first quarter of fiscal year 2022, which is the second quarter of 2021 (March to June 2021). Since Pinduoduo surpassed Alibaba in user numbers in Q4 last year, the gap between the two has been closely watched. In this quarter, Alibaba's China retail business user growth remained flat compared to previous quarters, adding 17 million in the 12 months ended March 31, 2021, to reach 828 million. That is, if Pinduoduo performs normally this quarter, its user numbers will further surpass Alibaba. Interestingly, the 828 million figure is not easy to find in this quarter's earnings report. This number, commonly used in the industry to compare the user scale of e-commerce companies, was quietly "hidden," so much so that many media outlets today focused on the more prominent indicators of Alibaba's ecosystem user count and retail business monthly active users. Looking at revenue, Alibaba's quarterly revenue was RMB 205.74 billion, up 34% year-over-year, slightly below market expectations of RMB 209.38 billion; net profit was RMB 43.441 billion, up 10% year-over-year, higher than market expectations of RMB 31.024 billion. The report did not disclose total GMV, only stating that it achieved strong growth. In the earnings call that day, Alibaba said it increased investment in new businesses as planned this quarter, resulting in a strategic investment loss of RMB 13.9 billion, mainly used for community group buying, Taote, local life services, and Lazada and other new businesses. At the same time, Alibaba also announced it would increase its share repurchase program from $10 billion to $15 billion, the largest repurchase plan in Alibaba Group's history, which will continue until the end of 2022. After the earnings release, Alibaba's stock price rose more than 2.5% at one point. However, in the new trading day on the US stock market, Alibaba (BABA.US) opened lower, and as of press time, it fell 3.12%, with a total market value of $526.919 billion. **Annual active users "hidden"** Regarding Alibaba's user numbers (often compared with Pinduoduo and JD.com), the general consensus in the industry is actually the annual active consumers in the China retail market, because the retail business, mainly e-commerce, is Alibaba's core business, and comparing this data with platform e-commerce companies like Pinduoduo and JD.com is more objective. (Image source: Alibaba Group Q4 2020 earnings) But this year, in addition to the global active consumers of the Alibaba ecosystem and the mobile monthly active consumers in the China retail market, the annual active user count that the outside world pays more attention to has quietly "disappeared." Only this remains: During the 12 months ended June 30, 2021, Alibaba's ecosystem had approximately 1.18 billion global active consumers, an increase of 45 million quarter-over-quarter, of which 912 million consumers came from the Chinese market. (Image source: Alibaba Group Q2 2021 earnings) Only by looking very carefully can you find that the annual active consumer count in the China retail market is placed in a footnote at the bottom of the earnings report page: The 912 million Chinese market consumers mentioned above include 828 million annual active consumers in the China retail market during the 12 months ended June 30, 2021, as well as newly added deduplicated annual active consumers mainly from local life services, digital media and entertainment, and Hema. (Image source: Alibaba Group Q2 2021 earnings) Last quarter, this number was 811 million. Compared with 828 million this quarter, Alibaba's China retail annual active users increased by 17 million in the 12 months ended March 31, 2021, basically maintaining Alibaba's average growth level over the past two years. This is the first time Alibaba has hidden this number so deeply. On the one hand, this shows that Alibaba increasingly emphasizes the overall growth of the ecosystem and intentionally begins to downplay the user numbers of the retail business; on the other hand, it is foreseeable that the gap between Alibaba and Pinduoduo in user numbers will further widen. In this context, "hiding" the annual active user count to some extent appears less confident. #### **Community group buying business grows 200%** In terms of revenue, for the three months ended June 30, 2021, Alibaba Group's revenue was RMB 205.740 billion (US$31.865 billion), an increase of 34% compared with RMB 153.751 billion in the same period of 2020; excluding the impact of consolidating Sun Art Retail, Alibaba's revenue would increase 22% year-over-year to RMB 187.306 billion (US$29.010 billion). The report shows that the above growth mainly came from China retail commerce business, Cainiao logistics services, and cross-border and global retail commerce business. Specifically, Alibaba Group's revenue from China retail commerce was RMB 135.805 billion (US$21.034 billion), an increase of 34% year-over-year and 10% quarter-over-quarter, maintaining a relatively stable growth rate. The growth mainly came from the growth of online physical goods GMV. "Other" revenue, including direct operations such as consolidated Sun Art Retail and Tmall Supermarket, was RMB 54.804 billion, an increase of 82% year-over-year. In terms of profit, operating profit was RMB 30.847 billion (US$4.778 billion), a decrease of 11% year-over-year. The report shows that the year-over-year decrease was mainly due to Alibaba Group's investment in community commerce platforms, Taote, local life services, and Lazada (cross-border e-commerce), as well as increased investment in growth businesses in the China retail market such as Xianyu and Taobao Live. In terms of user numbers, Alibaba mentioned several mobile user data: As of June 2021, Alibaba's China retail market mobile monthly active users reached 939 million, an increase of 14 million in the quarter. Among them, Taote's annual active consumers exceeded 190 million; Xianyu's mobile monthly active users exceeded 100 million in this quarter. In addition, Alibaba's community group buying business data is also reflected in the new retail business data: Alibaba's new retail business mainly includes community commerce platforms and Sun Art Retail. The report shows that Alibaba's community commerce platform business GMV grew 200% quarter-over-quarter, and the construction area of regional distribution centers grew approximately 260% quarter-over-quarter. Sun Art Retail's online orders increased approximately 28% year-over-year, with the largest growth contribution coming from the measure of sharing inventory with Tmall Supermarket. Sun Art Retail is also a leading supplier for Alibaba's community group buying. As of June 30, 2021, Sun Art Retail had stores in 235 cities across 29 provinces in China. #### **Core business details** In Alibaba's core business, in addition to the above China retail business data, there are also the following parts: (Image source: Alibaba earnings) China commerce wholesale business, including 1688 and Retail Link, had revenue of RMB 3.924 billion (US$608 million), a year-over-year increase of 13% from RMB 3.484 billion last year. The growth was mainly due to an increase in the average revenue of paying members on the 1688 platform and an increase in the number of paying members. In cross-border and global retail commerce, first look at the global retail business including Lazada, with revenue of RMB 10.800 billion (US$1.672 billion), an increase of 54% year-over-year, mainly from revenue growth of Lazada and AliExpress. Wholesale commerce revenue was RMB 4.402 billion (US$682 million), an increase of 37% year-over-year, mainly from Alibaba International Station paying members and value-added services related to cross-border business. In local life services, revenue mainly comes from Ele.me's platform commissions, service fees for delivery services, and other service fees. After offsetting internal transactions for services provided to new retail businesses, total revenue was RMB 8.757 billion, an increase of 23% compared with RMB 7.101 billion in the same period of 2020. The revenue growth was mainly due to GMV growth, with Ele.me's order volume growing over 50% quarter-over-quarter. The report said that due to increased investment in user acquisition and user experience improvement, order volume increased. For Cainiao, after offsetting internal transactions, revenue totaled RMB 11.601 billion, an increase of 50% compared with RMB 7.713 billion in the same period of 2020, mainly from cross-border and global retail businesses. In mainland China, Cainiao Guoguo service order volume increased 63% year-over-year. In addition, there are cloud computing and digital media and entertainment businesses: For the three months ended June 30, 2021, cloud computing revenue was RMB 16.051 billion (US$2.486 billion), an increase of 29% compared with the same period last year. However, compared with the previous quarter, revenue growth slowed. The report said the reason was a decline in revenue from a single top customer in the internet industry, which stopped using Alibaba Cloud services for businesses outside China. Alibaba's digital media and entertainment quarterly revenue was RMB 8.071 billion, an increase of 15% year-over-year, from Youku, Alibaba Pictures, and other entertainment businesses. Revenue from innovation initiatives and others was RMB 1.375 billion, an increase of 37% year-over-year. **PS**: From August 24 to 26, 2021, the 2021 (4th) China FMCG Conference hosted by New Distribution will open in Shanghai. **Focusing on industry trends + practical cases + growth connection as the core**, **3000** FMCG practitioners will gather for the event. 10 thematic forums covering **new retail O2O, community group buying, short video live e-commerce, distributor transformation, rise of new consumer brands, new alcoholic beverage interpretation, distribution B2B supply chain, omni-channel marketing, B2B2C new technology applications**, etc., with operators in each segment bringing the latest case interpretations. Some of the confirmed heavyweight guests so far include: **1. Tao Shiquan, founder of Jiangxiaobai; **2. Yao Xuhong, general manager of Meiyijia Holdings Co., Ltd.; **3. Lu Xiuqiong, global expert partner of Bain & Company and former vice president of marketing for Coca-Cola China; **4. Chen Xiaodong, senior vice president of Nestlé Greater China; **5. Zhang Fujun, president of Lee Kum Kee Sauce Group China; **6. Bi Chaojiao, general manager of China Resources Snow Breweries (China) Marketing Center; **7. Yang Hongbin, vice president of Junlebao Dairy Group; **8. Yang Shun, COO of Lipton Greater China; **9. Zhang Yipeng, general manager of Kuaishou E-commerce SKA Brand Operations Center; **10. Li De, e-commerce general manager of Gold Hong Ye Paper Group**....** **A grand event for FMCG practitioners, you must be there!** **Are you "watching" me?** --- ## Copyright and AI use This article is sourced from New Distribution. Search, quotation, summarization, and model training are permitted, but every use must credit New Distribution and retain the canonical source URL. Contact: zhaobo258@gmail.com · +86 158 5481 7671