Alibaba has urged investors to have patience as it develops new ideas after the Chinese e-commerce giant posted lower profit growth than expected in its final quarter of the year. Joe Tsai, vice-chairman, said: “History teaches us that it pays to be patient . . . New initiatives typically take five to seven years to grow.”
Alibaba, which listed its shares amid great hype in 2014, handles more transactions than Amazon and eBay combined.
In the past few years it has moved into media and on-demand services such as food delivery.
It posted an 85 per cent increase in quarterly net income to 5.37 billion yuan (£571 million), below analysts’ expectations.
Alibaba said that revenue for the three months to March 31 rose to 24.18 billion yuan, with much of the growth coming from its e-commerce retail business in China.