China's Biggest Online Shopping Festival Always Saw Grand Announcements From Its E-Commerce Giants; There Weren't Many This Year

China's annual Singles' Day shopping spree was subdued this year, with no boasting about sales volume, as the country's chastened e-commerce sector kept a low profile amid a government crackdown on tech companies.

While, the world's largest annual shopping event, Singles' Day, was expected to generate tens of billions of dollars in revenue for the country's leading e-commerce giants, the tone at this year's extravaganza is far more cautious than in previous years.

For years, the world's largest shopping festival has been accompanied by aggressive advertisements and frenzied hourly updates from industry giant Alibaba outlining ever-increasing sales statistics comparable to several countries' annual GDP. But as of midday 11 November (local time), there were no rolling totals or celebratory remarks from executives from major platforms.

Singles' Day is usually a major deal in China, but it was mostly overlooked by official media, with many sites concentrating instead on the sixty-second anniversary of China's Air Force's formation, which comes on the same day.

The annual shopping event has become a carefully observed measure of consumer spending in the world's second-largest economy, dwarfing the pre-Christmas Black Friday marketing in the United States. Alibaba's and JD.com's platforms generated a combined total of over $100 billion in sales last year.

However, due to government oversight, the normal buzz was dampened this year, with e-commerce platforms keeping their heads down. This is happening as Beijing has targeted tech companies for suspected data exploitation and monopolistic business tactics, but it also appears to be motivated in part by broader concerns that big tech has become too powerful and unregulated.

Chinese firms like Alibaba, Tencent, and JD have been rocked by the government investigation, with their stock prices plummeting by billions of dollars, but experts say the ruling Communist Party is unlikely to seriously stifle e-commerce.

The party is pursuing a long-term effort to shift China's economy away from a reliance on manufacturing, exports, and government investment, as well as toward a more market-based, consumer-driven model.

The coronavirus pandemic has boosted online purchases even more, according to Chinese executives. But if 11 November is any indicator, Singles' Day may become far less popular in the future.

As per previous reports, it was understood that Beijing is promoting the “common prosperity" narrative that criticises China's super-rich and corporate dominance while advocating for a more equitable division of the country's economic benefits. So, the aggressive sales pitches and celebration of unrestrained consumerism associated with Singles' Day may be seen by the Chinese Communist Party as incompatible with those goals.

Chinese authorities released specific Singles' Day guidelines last weekend, reminding platforms that making false claims about discounts or product performance, manipulating sales data, and selling counterfeit products are all prohibited.

This year, local media organisations have reported less aggressive promotional activity. Financial-news website Jiemian.com said in a report: "Although the excitement remains, the smell of gunpowder among the e-commerce giants is significantly weakened."

However, the major player Alibaba had previously stated that hundreds of brands had a better start this year than the prior year, but gave no particular data. According to an Alibaba spokesperson, numbers will be released once the shopping event's window closes.