Alibaba's revenue up by 14% YOY in Q2 2023

Alibaba's profit has increased 14% year-over-year to RMB234,156 million (US$32,292 million) in Q2 2023, due to improvements across all business segments.

According to the June quarter 2023 results released by the company, its income from operations was RMB42,490 million (US$5,860 million) during the period, an increase of 70% year-over-year. Excluding the reversal of share-based compensation expense of RMB6,901 million (US$952 million) as discussed in “June Quarter Other Financial Results” below, income from operations would have increased by 43% year-over-year. Adjusted EBITA, a non-GAAP measurement, increased 32% year-over-year to RMB45,371 million (US$6,257 million).

The total revenue of Taobao and Tmall Group for the quarter ended 30 June 2023 has increased 12% YOY to reach US$15.9 billion. Revenue from the group's China commerce retail business for the period was RMB109,828 million (US$15,146 million), an increase of 13% compared to RMB97,423 million in the same quarter of 2022.

Customer management revenue increased by 10% year-over-year, primarily due to the increase in merchant’s willingness to invest in advertising and increase in online physical goods GMV generated on Taobao and Tmall, excluding unpaid order. The growth also reflected a successful 6.18 Shopping Festival that generated solid growth in order volume and average order value, said the report.

Furthermore, direct sales and other revenue under China's commerce retail business in the quarter were RMB30,167 million (US$4,160 million), an increase of 21% as compared to RMB24,998 million in the same quarter of 2022, primarily due to strong sales driven by the consumer electronics category.

In terms of its international commerce retail business, the revenue in the quarter was RMB17,138 million (US$2,364 million), an increase of 60% compared to RMB10,742 million in the same quarter of 2022. The increase was primarily due to strong combined order growth of retail businesses driven by solid performance of all major retail platforms, and improvements in monetisation. 

Meanwhile, revenue from digital media and entertainment group was RMB5,381 million (US$742 million) in the quarter, an increase of 36% compared to RMB3,966 million in the same quarter of 2022, primarily driven by growth in our online entertainment business and strong recovery of offline entertainment business.

Commenting on the overall performance, Daniel Zhang, chairman and chief executive officer of Alibaba, said, “Through this self-driven transformation, we aim to catalyse innovation, promote vitality in our organisation and enable businesses to focus on long-term growth. We look forward to positive impacts on our business, including strengthening competitiveness, sustainable growth and shareholder value creation.”

Replenished by chief financial officer Toby Xu, “We repurchased US$3.1 billion worth of ADSs this quarter, which is supported by our continuous generation of strong free cash flow. Our strong free cash flow and balance sheet put us in an excellent position to strengthen our competitiveness and capture new opportunities.”

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