COVID-19 generated an increase in demand for online sales of physical goods due to quarantine restrictions imposed in many countries.1 Overall retail sales declined by 1% in a group of seven countries in 2020 included in a UN report while online retail grew by 22%.
The seven countries included in the report by United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTD) are Australia, Canada, China, South Korea, Singapore, UK, and the U.S. China and the U.S. lead the global retail market with total sales of $5,681 billion and $5,638 billion respectively in 2020.
China also has the largest online retail sales of US$1,414.3 billion in 2020, followed by the U.S. with $791.7 billion.
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China’s online sales accounted for 24.9% of the total retail market. South Korea’s online share is the highest of 25.9%.
UNCTD’s report also identified the top 13 B2C e-commerce companies by GMV, led by Alibaba, Amazon, JD, Pinduoduo, Shopify, eBay, and Meituan.
Among the top 13 companies, the ones with the highest growth in 2020 are Shopify, Walmart, and Pinduoduo.
CIW members can download the report here (CIW Standard annual billing and all CIW Premium subscribers).