Chinese e-commerce behemoth Alibaba broke records on Singles Day. The company reported that it processed $18 billion worth of trade on the day, showing a 32 percent increase over the previous year figure of $14.3 billion. The company also reported that 82 percent of the purchases were made from mobile devices.

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Singles Day is held on November 11 every year. Alibaba started the sales celebration in 2009. This year, it reached $1 billion sales within five minutes while it took only an hour to hit $5 billion mark. The company took just 90 minutes to reach the milestone in 2015.

Daniel Zhang, chief executive officer of Alibaba, said, "Back in 2013, 35 billion yuan ($5.14 bin; £4bn) was our one-day gross merchandise volume." Singles Day is now bigger than both Black Friday and Cyber Monday, two major shopping events in the US.

Alibaba said that it featured six million products from 30,000 brands. The event included 40,000 merchants. Alibaba rival JD.com reported that it received more orders in the first nine hours of trading than it did in the entire event in 2014.

Singles Day event is celebrated with show and pomp as Alibaba lined up stars such as Kobe Bryant to make an appearance. The event is likely to pass the $20 billion mark. Despite record-setting turnover, this year's growth rate lagged behind the previous year's growth rate of 60 percent.

Alibaba chairman Jack Ma stated, "On November 11, Singles Day, we see the huge potential of China's consumer market. To achieve this much with out current, basic infrastructure, I am feeling extremely satisfied."

TagsAlibaba, Singles Day, JD.com