Alibaba beats estimates as pandemic fuels online, cloud computing demand

China’s Alibaba Group Holding Ltd beat quarterly revenue and profit estimates on Thursday, as its core commerce and cloud computing businesses continued to grow following China’s emergence from the coronavirus lockdown.

Sales from the commerce business alone jumped 34% to 133.32 billion yuan ($19.27 billion) in the quarter ending in June, slightly slower than a year earlier but still enough to prod its shares higher after the results.

The company’s stock has soared 23% this year as investors globally poured money into technology businesses seen as “stay-at-home” winners from the pandemic, and Alibaba said it had bounced back from a hit to Chinese consumer spending at the start of this year.