Alibaba Group has summed up the results of its latest sale, which is traditionally held in China every year on November 11.

In China, this day is called Singles’ Day, initially popular among Chinese students. It later became a day of massive sales and significant price reductions, thanks to Alibaba Group, which owns Taobao, AliExpress, Tmall, and other platforms. The total sales on November 11, 2019, amounted to $38.4 billion.

In 2019, Alibaba Group held its 10th-anniversary sale. As per tradition, a grand show was broadcast on television that day. This year, international star Taylor Swift was invited to perform.

For several years in a row, Chinese sales have surpassed Black Friday in America in terms of scale.

This time, the first billion-dollar mark was crossed almost immediately after the sale started, within just over a minute. Compared to previous years, the volume of sales increased not only within China but also internationally. For example:

  • Ukrainians spent more than 2 million hryvnias on this day.
  • In Russia, sales volumes amounted to 17.2 billion rubles.

On this day, Ukrainians participated in the sale so actively that the payment system PrivatBank barely managed to process the requests. Most orders were placed through AliExpress, but some were made directly on Taobao without intermediaries. On Taobao, a Chinese clothing website, there is an option to place orders in Russian. However, compared to previous years, breaking sales records took significantly more time this time.

In November 2019, Alibaba Group’s Founder Visited Ukraine

On November 8, Jack Ma, the founder of Alibaba Group, visited Ukraine to deliver a keynote at an international economic forum, where he personally met the current President of Ukraine.

It also became known that Taobao’s Russian-language section featured souvenir 100-hryvnia bills with the image of Zelensky. The souvenir costs 35 yuan, equivalent to slightly over 115 hryvnias. Both sides of the bill feature a portrait of Volodymyr Zelensky. The appearance of this souvenir might be linked to the popularity of the TV series “Servant of the People” in China, where it won the award for “Best Foreign Film.”

During his visit to Ukraine, Jack Ma was genuinely surprised that Ukrainians have to wait 1.5 months for packages from Taobao and other Chinese stores. One can only hope that in the future, it will not only be convenient to shop on Taobao in Russian, but the delivery times will also become significantly shorter.