Alibaba is now the world's largest retailer

Chinese eCommerce group Alibaba says it has become the world’s largest retailer. According to the company, it surpassed American Wal-Mart last month, based on its total gross merchandise volume (GMV).

Bigger than Wal-Mart

Alibaba did not say how high that GMV was at the end of the fiscal year, which closed on 31 March 2016, but it did say it surpassed the 3 trillion yuan (420 billion euro) milestone on 21 March. In its past fiscal year, Wal-Mart reached 482.1 billion dollars (423 billion euro).

This record number shows the retailer’s power is mostly online and not so much offline, according to the Chinese online retailer itself: “We used 13 years to demonstrate the power of a different business model compared with brick-and-mortar retailers”, a statement read.

Alibaba has no plans to slow down anytime soon: by 2020, it aims to have a 6 trillion yuan (840 billion euro) gross merchandise volume and by 2024, it hopes to have a customer base of 2 billion consumers.