Online discount retailer Vipshop sees 16.4% revenue growth in Q3

GUANGZHOU - Vipshop Holdings Limited, a Chinese online discount retailer, on Thursday announced that its net revenue for the third quarter of 2018 rose 16.4 percent year-on-year to 17.8 billion yuan ($2.6 billion).

The growth was primarily driven by increases in both the number of active customers and average revenue per customer, the company said in its quarterly report.

Net income attributable to Vipshop's shareholders was 228.7 million yuan, down 32.4 percent from a year earlier. Despite the profit decline, Vipshop has been in the black for 24 straight quarters.

Total operating expenses were 3.5 billion yuan, up 9.4 percent year-on-year.

The number of active customers for Q3 increased by 11 percent year on year to 26.5 million, while the average revenue per customer increased by about five percent.

"We remain focused on our merchandising strategy, aiming to further deepen our expertise in the field of discount retailing," said Eric Shen, chairman and chief executive officer of Vipshop.

For the fourth quarter of 2018, Vipshop expects its total net revenue to be between 26.1 billion yuan and 27.3 billion yuan, representing an annual growth of about eight to 13 percent.

Vipshop, established in 2008, went public at the New York Stock Exchange in March 2012.