China had more than 5000 different types of cross-border online platforms serving over 200,000 companies of e-commerce operations in 2015. Driven by the rapid growth of e-commerce, small and medium e-commerce companies has become a new growth focus in China.
Report of PayPal and Ipsos showed that 81% of Chinese consumer shopped online in 2015 and 35% bought cross-border products online. The ratio of cross-border online shoppers was only 26% in 2014.
Online shopping platforms in the United States, South Korea, and Japan were most popular among the Chinese cross-border shoppers in 2015. More affordable high-quality genuine products and new products were the main reasons for Chinese consumers.
Strong consumption power of Chinese online shoppers boosted many countries to publish special policies to support the cross-border consumption. For example, Korea Customs Service announced to ship goods to Qingdao logistics center as a cost-saving purpose and then to reach Chinese consumers by local courier system in 4-5 days.
China’s cross-border transaction value was predicted to reach 6.5 trillion yuan (US$0.997 trillion) in 2016 and would make up as high as 20% Chinese total foreign business with an annual growth rate of over 30% according to the Chinese Ministry of Commerce.