China’s dominant e-commerce firm Alibaba Group Holding raked in $23 billion worth of sales in the first nine hours of its annual Singles’ Day shopping extravaganza on Monday, setting records as the event celebrates its 11th year, reported Reuters.
The 24-hour shopping event is akin to Black Friday and Cyber Monday in the United States and has become a highlight of China’s e-commerce industry, with other retailers running concurrent promotions. This year, Alibaba netted $1 billion in sales in the event’s first 68 seconds.
China is on track to book $1.94 trillion in e-commerce sales in 2019, more than three times the United States which is in second place with $586.92 billion, a report from researcher eMarketer shows.