By George Stahl
Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. said revenue rose 40% during its
December quarter as the Chinese e-commerce giant saw a continued
surge in users buying items through mobile devices.
Shares of Alibaba, up 45% from its initial public offering price
of $68 in September, fell about 8.5% to $90.20 in premarket trading
as the company's revenue fell short of expectations..
The results come as Alibaba is embroiled in a rare, high-stakes
public dispute with a powerful Chinese government agency that is
accusing the company of allegedly failing to crack down on the sale
of fake goods, bribery and other illegal activity on its sites.
In response, Alibaba has said it is "willing to assume the
responsibility of fighting fakes" and that its effort "is far from
complete." But it also criticized the inspection methods of the
Chinese official and called the agency's conclusion biased.
For the December quarter, mobile transactions accounted for 42%
of Alibaba's overall transactions, up from 36% in the September
quarter and 20% from a year earlier. The number of active users on
Alibaba's mobile platforms rose to 265 million in December, up from
217 million in September from 136 million a year ago.
Alibaba's ability to boost revenue from its mobile platforms has
been scrutinized as more Chinese Internet users go online from
their mobile devices.
Overall, Alibaba's earnings fell 28% to $964 million, or 37
cents a share. Excluding certain items, per-share earnings rose 13%
to 81 cents a share. Revenue was $4.22 billion.
Analysts, on average, were expecting earnings of 75 cents a
share on revenue of $4.45 billion.
Alibaba said that on its China retail marketplaces, gross
merchandise volume for the quarter increased 49% and annual active
buyers rose 45% year-over-year.
Earlier this week, Yahoo Inc. unveiled a plan to spin off
tax-free its nearly $40 billion of holdings in Alibaba. The spinoff
is seen giving the Chinese e-commerce giant the chance to buy its
own shares at a lower tax rate than if it tried to acquire them
now.
Write to George Stahl at george.stahl@wsj.com
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