Is the era of Alibaba's high growth over?

China's Alibaba Group Holding Ltd missed analyst estimates for first-quarter revenue on Tuesday.

BUSINESS HIGHLIGHTS

In the quarter ended June 30, 2021:

• Overall, revenue rose about 34% to 205.74 billion yuan ($31.83 billion) in the first quarter ended June 30, below estimates for 209.39 billion yuan, Core commerce revenue for Alibaba rose about 35% to 180.24 billion yuan in the quarter, compared with estimates of 184.23 billion yuan. In the fourth quarter, the unit's revenue surged more than 70%.
• Non-GAAP net income was RMB43,441 million (US$6,728 million), an increase of 10% year-over-year, over estimates for 29.3 billion yuan. On an adjusted basis, the company earned 16.60 yuan per share, above estimates for 14.43 yuan.
• Annual active consumers of the Alibaba Ecosystem across the world reached approximately 1.18 billion for the twelve months ended June 30, 2021, an increase of 45 million from the twelve months ended March 31, 2021. This includes 912 million consumers in China1 and 265 million consumers overseas served by Lazada, AliExpress, Trendyol and Daraz.

If we focus on specific businesses, we can see that the growth of this financial report is mainly from the core e-commerce part

• Total commerce revenue was 180.2 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 35%.
• Revenue from cloud computing business was 16.05 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 29%.
• Revenue from Digital Media and Entertainment was RMB 8.073 billion, a year-on-year increase of 15%.
• Revenue from innovation initiatives and others was RMB 1.375 billion, a year-on-year increase of 37%.

Growth slowdown

Compared with cloud computing, digital media, e-commerce business is the main driving force driving the growth of Alibaba's business, but this time the e-commerce business also has hidden concerns. As mentioned in the last quarter, the reason for Alibaba’s revenue surge this time was mainly from other revenues. This part of revenue reached a staggering 54.8 billion yuan, an increase of 82% year-on-year, and this part of revenue was mainly due to the Oct. 2020 consolidation of Sun Art.

In the financial report, Alibaba also mentioned that if the revenue from Sun Art’s consolidation is deducted, Alibaba’s total revenue is 187.3 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of only 22%, and core e-commerce revenue is 161.8 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 21 %.

Facing the increasingly fierce competition in the Chinese e-commerce market , the company has increased its investment to support its retail platforms. Although Alibaba still leads the industry, Pduoduo Inc. (PDD), Byteance Ltd.'s short video platform Douyin and Tencent Holdings Ltd.’S social media application WeChat and other e-commerce competitors have reached consumers with new and innovative ways and gained market share.

Earlier this year, Alibaba stated that all incremental profits will be used to improve its platform, acquire new users and support merchants. On Tuesday, Alibaba said it will continue to make some investments that have already driven growth in key areas such as grocery shopping and consumers in lower-tier cities.

Investors had hoped that Alibaba's cloud computing business could drive growth, but the boost of this business slowed down. Alibaba said that its cloud computing business revenue increased by 29% year-on-year, but it was still dragged down by the loss of a major customer, a person familiar with the matter said the customer was Bytedance Inc..

The Wall Street Journal reported that the department also encountered difficulties in obtaining new contracts and arranging related meetings because regulators are reviewing its e-commerce business and sister company Ant Group Co.

Growth slowed in most of Alibaba’s major divisions from cloud to e-commerce, underlining fears that the mounting list of new government regulations is constraining expansion and increasing companies’ burdens.

In a sign of the times, Chief Executive Officer Daniel Zhang on Tuesday endorsed a string of government policies enacted during a tumultuous 2021, from strict curbs on data collection to excessive subsidies.

The company tried to assure investors by announcing it will now repurchase $15 billion in shares through next year, up from a $10 billion repurchase plan that had been in place. It also disclosed it had repurchased $3.7 billion worth of its US-traded shares since April.