Shanghai reports rise in online spending over New Year holiday

Shanghai has reported a rise in online retail spending over the New Year holiday, while street store trade remained comparable to last year.

Average daily consumption in Shanghai during the three-day New Year holiday, which began on Thursday, reached 12.2 billion yuan ($1.74 billion), up 2.5 percent year-on-year, statistics released by the Consumer Market Big Data Laboratory (Shanghai) showed.

Online retail spending averaged 5.71 billion yuan per day, up 5.5 percent from the same period last year, while daily consumption at bricks-and-mortar stores remained flat year-on-year at 6.49 billion yuan, the lab said.

Across Shanghai's 35 major business districts, average daily foot traffic totaled 6.4 million passenger trips, representing a year-on-year increase of 5.4 percent.

Consumption by visitors from outside Shanghai rose 7.0 percent year-on-year, while their total spending in the city increased 4.4 percent over the same period. Visitors from the Yangtze River Delta region accounted for a large share of consumption, with Jiangsu province ranking first at 21.3 percent in terms of person-times, followed by Zhejiang province at 8.9 percent.

Spending by inbound travelers drove strong growth in tax refund-related sales revenue, which surged 132.6 percent from a year earlier.