Alibaba (NYSE: BABA) reported fiscal first-quarter earnings on Thursday that beat expectations, boosted by its core e-commerce business and fast-growing cloud division.
Figures revealed revenue of 80.92 billion yuan ($12.23 billion U.S.) versus expectations of 80.75 billion yuan. This was a 61% rise from the 50.18 billion yuan reported in the same period last year.
Net income of 8.69 billion yuan, a 40.8% decline from the 14.68 billion yuan reported in the fiscal first quarter of 2017. Earnings per share were 3.30 yuan, versus 2.79 yuan.
Alibaba shares were up about 2.3% in pre-market trade but have been under pressure in recent months amid a broader selloff in Chinese stocks over concerns about the impact of the U.S.-China trade war. Shares hit a record high close of $210.86 on June 14, but have declined about 15.6% since. That equates to an $81.3-billion fall in market capitalization or value.
The stock is still up just over 3% year-to-date. The shares opened Thursday morning up $6.52, or 3.7%, at $184.37
Alibaba's core commerce business, which focuses on its online shopping sites Tmall and Taobao, is still the company's biggest unit, accounting for around 86% of revenues. Core commerce revenues came in at 69.19 billion yuan, just below analyst expectations of 70.49 billion yuan. This represented a 61% year-on-year rise.
Alibaba has been pushing its cloud business in recent years, and while still a small part of overall revenues, the growth has been huge. Cloud computing revenues totaled 4.7 billion yuan, a 93% year-on-year rise.
