Growth in Russian e-commerce market slows to 13% in 2017
MOSCOW. April 4 (Interfax) - The Russian e-commerce market saw growth slow to 13%, totaling 1.04 trillion rubles in 2017, the Retail Companies Association (ACORT) said.
Growth has slowed in comparison to 2016 when the e-commerce market expanded 21%.
"We did not reach the level that we had hoped for - 1.15 trillion rubles - not even close," ACORT President Alexei Fedorov said at a press conference in Moscow on Wednesday. He said that ACORT had expected growth of 22%-23% in 2017.
On the international e-commerce market, growth slowed to 24% from 37% in 2016 with the international e-commerce market worth 374.3 billion rubles in 2017.
A total of 380 million international goods mailings were sent from foreign internet stores, 67% of which were delivered by Russian Post.
Russian Post's share on the delivery market for e-commerce goods sent from foreign online retailers and deliveries on the domestic market was up 5 percentage points in 2017 according to ACORT data, to 67% from 62% in 2016. Russian Post's market share in cities with populations below 500,000 increased to 82% from 79%. In cities with populations from 500,000 to 1 million, Russian Post's share rose to 48% from 40% and in cities with over 1 million people - to 35% from 29%. Russian Post's revenue from its parcel business rose 21% to 48.9 billion rubles last year, accounting for 8.1% of its overall 178.1 billion rubles in revenue for the year.
ACORT is forecasting that the Russian e-commerce market will grow to 1.25 trillion in 2018.