What's going on?

Chinese ecommerce platform Pinduoduo revealed some eye-catching quarterly results on Monday.

What does this mean?

Folk wisdom says that lockdowns are bad for everyone besides Netflix and online shops � and the success of ecommerce firm Pinduoduo, amid China�s record Covid infections and locked-down cities, seems to confirm that. After all, you don�t stop buying groceries when you need to stay home: you just use a platform like Pinduoduo instead. Fresh produce, consumer electronics, and cosmetics were key money-makers last quarter:�as consumer spending recovered, they catapulted the firm�s revenue well past analyst expectations, to beat the same quarter last year by a stone-cold 65% (tweet this). No wonder investors pushed the company�s sturdy stock up 15% when the news broke.

Why should I care?

Zooming in: Heading for the heart of the Amazon.
Not content with domestic success, Pinduoduo�s already making moves overseas, launching the US shopping site Temu just a few months ago. But the going won�t be easy. For one, Temu�s encroaching on the territory of none other than Amazon, the titan of titans. And for another, the firm�s one- or two-week shipping times won�t endear it to impatient customers used to breakneck delivery. What might sweeten the deal, though, are its prices: the firm�s close ties with low-cost Chinese manufacturers keep its offerings cheap and cheerful.

The bigger picture: It�s crunch time.
The eruption of volcanic anti-lockdown protests in China has caught the world�s attention and put the government in an awkward bind: either perform a very public U-turn and risk a surge in deaths among the under-vaccinated elderly � or crack down and hope a flourish of the iron fist puts any further criticism to bed. And while economists at Abrdn don�t see China wavering from its zero-Covid approach in the near-term, those at Goldman Sachs do reckon there�s a 60% chance the country will reopen before next July.