(IDEX Online) - After taking in a billion dollars in just over a minute, this year's Singles Day has broken all records. The final total for the 24-hour shopping frenzy was $38.4 billion.
This was an increase of 26 percent compared to 2018.
"Today we showed the world what the future of consumption looks like for brands and consumers," said Fan Jiang, president of Taobao and Tmall. "We are meeting the growing demand of Chinese consumers and helping them upgrade their lifestyles, while introducing new users to our digital economy from across China and around the world."
Over 200,000 participating brands took part in the global shopping festival.
Singles Day was created by single students at Nanjing University in China back in 1993 as a type of anti-Valentine's day; one on which people could treat themselves to some retail therapy. The "modern day" 11.11 Shopping Festival was launched by the Alibaba Group in 2009 with just 27 retailers and has evolved into the most important retail event of the year.