Chinese e-commerce leader Alibaba said Wednesday that net profit increased 37 percent in the latest quarter as growth in cloud computing and other business lines helped offset a slowing expansion in core online retail. The company’s net profit grew to 33.0 billion yuan ($4.9 billion) in the October-December third quarter, compared to 24.1 billion yuan over the same period in 2017. Alibaba dominates China’s emerging consumer culture and its corporate results were widely anticipated for any signs of whether a worsening Chinese economic slowdown and the US-China trade tussle was curbing the country’s appetite for shopping.
