China’s PDD shares slide after weak consumer spending dents revenue

By Sophie Yu and Deborah Mary Sophia

(Reuters) -China’s PDD Holdings missed market estimates for quarterly revenue on Monday, as reduced consumer spending dented business at its domestic e-commerce platform Pinduoduo (NASDAQ:), sending the company’s shares down more than 25% in early trade.

A fragile economy, persistent weakness in the property sector and high unemployment rates, have led Chinese consumers to cut back on purchases, damaging the country’s retail and e-commerce sectors.

While Pinduoduo’s low prices and steep discounts on anything from groceries to earphones have attracted cost-conscious shoppers, major rivals have also offered heavy promotions on their own platforms, piling competitive pressure on PDD.

“Looking ahead, revenue growth will inevitably face pressure due to intensified competition and external challenges… Profitability will also likely be impacted as we continue to invest resolutely,” said PDD’s vice president of finance Jun Liu.

PDD said it would invest heavily in the platform’s trust and safety, and adopt policies to provide support for high-quality merchants, while tackling low-quality ones.

“We are prepared to accept short-term sacrifices and potential decline in profitability,” said Chairman and Co-CEO Chen Lei. “While encouraged by the solid progress we made in the past few quarters, we see many challenges ahead.”

M Science analyst Vinci Zhang said he was surprised by PDD Holdings’ performance.

“We know there’s a consumer spending slowdown, but there was hope that maybe PDD being the budget product platform with cheaper offerings can capture this slowdown, but it turns out that they are also losing,” Zhang said.

Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba (NYSE:) missed market estimates for revenue earlier this month, pinched by weaker domestic e-commerce sales, while JD (NASDAQ:).com’s quarterly revenue grew only 1.2%.

PDD reported revenue of 97.06 billion yuan ($13.64 billion) in the second quarter, compared with analysts’ average estimate of 100 billion yuan, according to LSEG data.

Operating expenses rose by 48% in the three months ended June 30, as the company invested in marketing, advertising and promotions to attract shoppers.

General and administrative costs more than tripled in the quarter to 1.84 billion yuan, because of staff-related expenses.

($1 = 7.1173 renminbi)