Worldview: Alibaba’s Earnings Expose China’s Uneven Recovery

🇨🇳 China’s Alibaba Group Holdings sees Q4 profits tumble. The country’s largest e-commerce group by market share has reported an 86 percent decline in net income, reaching 3.27 billion yuan ($452 million), compared to 23.52 billion yuan a year earlier, and revenue growth of 7 percent in the quarter ended March. Following its split into six units last year, the group has focused on low-cost categories in response to cautious consumer spending. “We have seen green shoots in some discretionary items like apparel and electronics,” said chairman Joseph Tsai, adding that the market needed to “wait and see” on the Chinese economy’s recovery. “We know Chinese consumers have the ability to spend, but that willingness to spend reflects their confidence about the future.” Revenue at its domestic e-commerce unit, Taobao and Tmall Group, a key distribution channel for global fashion brands, increased 4 percent, in a sign that at least some of Alibaba’s efforts to claw back market share from increasingly aggressive competitors like Pinduoduo and Douyin are working. [Reuters, Bloomberg]

🇮🇳 Reliance Retail inks partnership with Asos for the India market. The retail arm of oil-to-telecoms conglomerate Reliance Industries has struck a deal with the British online fashion retailer as its exclusive partner across all online and offline channels in the country. The group is a leading player in India’s fashion industry through its Reliance Retail Ventures holdings, international fashion brand distribution partnerships, investments in local designer brands, e-commerce sites and luxury malls. Reliance Retail Ventures director Isha Ambani said the deal would help bring “the pulse of global trends to Indian shores [and ensure] our customers have access to the cutting-edge fashion styles they crave.” [BoF Inbox]

🇬🇭 Ghana’s secondhand clothing dealers dispute waste claims. According to a report by the Ghana Used Clothing Dealers Association, less than 5 percent of the used clothes imported into the country can be considered waste. The association’s claims are at odds with estimates frequently cited by international media and NGOs that around 40 percent of items entering the country’s Kantamanto market end up in landfill. “Those who have spent years using and repeating false and inaccurate figures should apologise now for the damage they have done and the harm they have caused,” said the association’s general secretary Edward Atobrah Binkley. The sentiment was echoed by UK-based Textile Recycling Association chief executive Alan Wheeler who warned against relying on “anecdotal evidence or isolated case studies.” [Materials Recycling World]

🇧🇷 Brazil’s leather and footwear industries hit by floods. The catastrophic floods that paralysed Rio Grande do Sul state earlier this month, leaving parts of its capital Porto Alegre submerged, have destroyed or damaged factories including Calçados Beira-Rio in the region where there is a cluster of footwear and leather processing companies. As of May 16, 147 people have died, and 1.5 million residents have been impacted including countless workers in the sector. [Sourcing Journal]

🇸🇦 Saudi Fashion Commission launches production facility. The first studio of its kind in Saudi Arabia for product development, The Lab has been equipped with the latest fashion manufacturing technologies. “In the heart of Riyadh, the studio facilitates the manufacturing process, enabling our designers and local brands to realize their creative visions,” said commission CEO Burak Cakmak. Separately, Tima Abid and Sara Altwaim were among the local designers showing swimwear and resort wear at the kingdom’s inaugural Red Sea Fashion Week held in the Ummahat Islands. [Saudi Gazette, The National]

🇨🇳 WeChat owner Tencent sees quarterly profit soar by 62%. The company behind the popular super-app, a marketing and e-commerce sales channel for fashion brands, has reported a stronger-than-anticipated surge in net income in the three months ended March. Growth was largely driven by an increase in ad sales for the group’s video platform that gained traction against rival ByteDance, the owner of TikTok and Douyin. Revenue rose 6% to 159.5 billion yuan ($22 billion), compared with the 158.8 billion yuan average estimate. [Bloomberg, Financial Times]

🇨🇳 Burberry’s quarterly sales to Chinese consumers decline 12%. Overall sales at the British luxury brand also fell 12 percent in the first three months of 2024. “Spending by Chinese tourists at our stores in London is less than half of what it was compared to the pre-pandemic, whereas it’s more than tripled in Paris,” said CEO Jonathan Akeroyd. “We’ve seen a significant reduction in traffic into most of the malls [in China] that we’re working with. I don’t think this is exclusive to us.” [BoF, CNN, Financial Times]

🇮🇳 India’s Safari Industries posts 13.4% profit increase in Q4. The company behind the Safari luggage and accessories brand has reported consolidated net profit of 43.19 crore rupees ($5.1 million) in the quarter ended March 2024, against 38.08 crore rupees in the same period in the previous year. [Economic Times]

🇨🇳 Chanel plans to restage its cruise show in Hong Kong. The French luxury brand will repeat the 2025 cruise show that it presented in Marseille this month in Hong Kong on Nov. 5. If it goes ahead, the event will follow a cancelled repeat showing of the brand’s 2019 cruise show due to pro-democracy protests. [South China Morning Post]

🇮🇳 Traditional Indian fashion brand TCNS Clothing reports loss. The company, which was acquired by Aditya Birla Fashion and Retail Ltd last year, has posted a net loss of 63.60 crore rupees ($7.6 million) in the quarter ended March 2024, against a loss of 28.12 crore rupees during the same period last year. The company’s portfolio includes brands W, Aurelia, Wishful, Folksong and Elleven, [Economic Times]

🇨🇳 China’s social networks remove content that ‘flaunts wealth’. Weibo, WeChat owner Tencent, Douyin and Xiaohongshu are among the Chinese social media companies to resume the crackdown that has been ongoing intermittently since 2016 as part of a wider campaign sanctioned by the Chinese authorities to “purify the internet cultural environment.” Weibo said it had been rooting out “undesirable value-orientated content,” including content “showing off wealth and worshipping money”. [The Guardian]

🇮🇳 Indian cosmetics brand Colorbar plans to go public. Samir Modi, the managing director of parent company Modi Enterprises, which owns and operates Colorbar, 24Seven and Modicare brands, has said that he is preparing to undertake an IPO of the largest brand in the portfolio in the next three years, following an international expansion next year. [Economic Times]

🇨🇳 Q1 revenue down 7.5% at China’s Pou Sheng International. The Hong Kong-listed multi-brand sportswear retail giant that trades as YYsports in the mainland has reported unaudited revenue of 5.40 billion yuan ($746.4 million) in the first quarter of fiscal 2024, down from 5.83 billion yuan year over year. [Fibre2Fashion]

🇯🇵 Japan’s sportswear giant Asics reports Q1 sales surge. The sneaker and athletic wear maker has posted a 14.3 percent increase in net sales in the first quarter of fiscal 2024, reaching 174.1 billion yen ($1.1 billion). Operating profit during the period soared 52.9 percent, amounting to 33.812 billion yen. [Fibre2Fashion]

🇨🇱 Chilean retailer Ripley reports 6.5% revenue increase in Q1. The Santiago-based department store and mall operator recorded sales of 460.987 billion Chilean pesos ($517 million), boosted by the opening of several shopping centres in Peru, and losses of 2.480 billion pesos ($2.78 million), reflecting an 87 percent improvement from the same period in the previous year. [Graciela Martin for BoF, Modaes]

🇮🇳 India’s Cantabil Retail posts 9% profit rise in Q1. The New Delhi-based company producing and retailing its namesake fashion brand has reported net profit of 18.3 crore rupees ($2.2 million) in the quarter ended March 2024. To further growth, the firm with over 500 monobrand stores nationwide raised capital worth 50.4 crore rupees ($6 million) during the period, according to MD Vijay Bansal. [Economic Times]

🇨🇳 Chinese designer brand Calvin Luo to shutter. The Chongqing-born, Shenzhen-raised designer who studied at Parson’s in New York has announced that his Calvinluo brand will gradually cease operating from the first quarter of 2025. Established in 2014, the brand has sold to dozens of retailers globally and established several monobrand stores across the country. [Jing Daily]

🇪🇬 Egyptian investor Rachid Mohamed Rachid launches brand. The Italy-based entrepreneur behind Swiss-based Alsara Investment Group, whose subsidiary Bidayat has a stake in brands like Okhtein, Khrisjoy and Azza Fahmy, has appointed his daughter Salma Rachid to design the new luxury label called Retori. [Milano Finanza]

🇮🇳 Jimmy Choo taps Indian princess Gauravi Kumari. The London luxury brands has partnered with the member of the Jaipur royal family, in a brand ambassadorship deal that extends to modelling in campaigns. [BoF Inbox]

🇨🇳 Rolex names Chinese director Jia Zhangke as ambassador. The Swiss luxury watch brand tapped the award-winning film director behind movies like “Still Life” and “A Touch of Sin” at the Cannes Film Festival where he premiered his new film “Caught by the Tides.” [Jing Daily]

🇦🇺 R.M.Williams designs Australian Paralympic team uniforms. The Australian bush clothing and footwear brand has unveiled the collection with accessible features that will be worn by the national team at this year’s Paris games. [Ragtrader]

🇨🇳 Piaget names Chinese actress Tong Yao as ambassador. The Swiss luxury jewellery and watch brand has partnered with the award-winning actress to endorse products for the China market. [Jing Daily]