JD / JD-SW will release its latest quarterly earnings report on November 13, 2025 (before U.S. market opens). The market is focusing on changes in subsidy intensity and the effect of retail coordination on profitability, with adjustments in food delivery and instant retail strategies becoming the key observation points.

Market Forecast

According to Tiger Trade data, the market consensus expects JD.com's third-quarter revenue to be RMB 294 billion, up 12.91% year-on-year; earnings per share are estimated at RMB 2.757, down 68.24% year-on-year.

This quarter's key focuses are the narrowing and precision targeting of subsidies for JD.com's food delivery and instant retail, as well as improved cross-flow efficiency with supermarkets/department stores. The company's current main business highlight is online direct sales, with revenue of approximately RMB 282.414 billion, supported by the resilience of categories like electronics and supermarkets through strong supply chain and genuine product guarantees. The company’s promising growth area lies in its service and other segments, with revenue of approximately RMB 74.246 billion, showing steady year-on-year performance. Logistics and advertising services remain important growth drivers.

Review of the Previous Quarter

In the previous quarter, JD.com achieved revenue of RMB 356.66 billion, up about 22.40% year-on-year, with a gross profit margin of approximately 9.67% (improved year-on-year). Net profit attributed to the parent company was around RMB 6.178 billion, down year-on-year, with a net profit margin of approximately 1.73% (declined year-on-year), and adjusted earnings per share of about RMB 4.97, down approximately 46.90% year-on-year. Last quarter's focus was on the high-intensity investment in food delivery and instant retail, which brought growth in orders and traffic, but significantly dragged down profit and EBIT performance. By business segment, online direct sales revenue was about RMB 282.414 billion, while service and other revenue was around RMB 74.246 billion, both contributing to overall revenue growth.

Quarter Outlook

Adjustment of Food Delivery and Instant Retail Strategies

Optimizing subsidy structures and investment rhythms is the primary variable this quarter. After high-intensity investment in the second quarter, the market is highly concerned about whether the company will return to a more sustainable subsidy model, shifting from "scale first" to "efficiency first." If subsidies focus on high-repurchase, high-ticket categories, combined with more precise membership and cross-marketing strategies, unit economics may improve, easing pressure on EBIT and net profit margins.

The efficiency of converting food delivery orders to supermarkets and department stores will be a core indicator of the synergy effect. Last quarter, the company disclosed a high level of daily orders for food delivery that significantly increased traffic, but also notably suppressed profits. If algorithms, systems, and tools iterations are implemented this quarter to improve conversion rates and advertising monetization efficiency, it might marginally improve gross and operating profit margins.

Differentiation in fulfillment and supply-side capability remains a competitive focus. The company emphasizes the advantages of its nationwide warehousing and distribution network, after-sales and installation network. Integrating high-frequency food delivery fulfillment with supermarket warehousing and distribution can relieve fulfillment cost pressure, reduce unit order costs and subsidy demands, and facilitate scalability on the logistics front.

Resilience of Retail Core Business and Structural Opportunities

The resilience of online direct sales remains the key pillar for the group’s cash flow and profits, with electronics maintaining prosperity under policies like trade-in. If macro consumption remains stable and year-end promotion points add up, the company is likely to sustain stable growth, reducing pressure on overall gross profit and cash flow, providing room for investment in new business.

Growth in service and other segments relies on logistics and advertising services. If platform traffic structure improves due to food delivery and instant retail, advertising conversion and logistics order volume may simultaneously rise. Improved structural profitability could partially offset the investment pressure from food delivery.

On the system and capability building front, last quarter the company mentioned iterations in algorithms and systems. Intensive tool rollouts this quarter to enhance cross-category purchase paths and intelligent supply matching will boost user repurchase and platform stickiness, benefiting lower customer acquisition and advertising costs.

Exploration of Supply Chain and Quality Standardization

The market is watching the company's attempts in restaurant supply chain and store standardization. These explorations improve food safety and taste consistency, potentially reducing order returns and negative reviews, thereby boosting order profitability, and may form differentiated long-term barriers for the platform.

The balance between cost and efficiency of rider protection and compliant employment is another focal point. If the company achieves a better combination in employment models and delivery networks, improving peak-hour fulfillment capacity and reducing non-peak-hour redundancy costs, efficiency improvements may limit loss expansion.

Overall, the key this quarter lies in converting last quarter's traffic and order growth into higher-quality revenue and cash flow. Precision subsidies, improved ad ROI, and enhanced cross-flow efficiency might marginally improve financial indicators.

Analyst Opinions

Recent institutional and analyst opinions focus on the "divide between optimistic and pessimistic views." Overall, the trend leans more towards cautious pessimism, mainly citing subsidy investment pressure on profits and uncertainty about the pace of unit economics improvement:

• Some institutions noted that last quarter’s actual EBIT significantly fell short of market expectations, with food delivery investment exceeding expectations, causing short-term pressure on operating profit. Opinions stress that "profit downward pressure has not been fully released before rational stage of subsidy war enters," and estimate "adjusted earnings per share will remain clearly down year-on-year this quarter," suggesting to watch out for precise subsidy and coordination data realization.

• Another institution stated frankly in its review: "Core retail growth is impressive, but new business losses exceeded consensus expectations. Short-term stock drivers will depend on the company’s correction speed of subsidy strategies and system capabilities." It emphasized that "if tool and system rollouts intensify this quarter, enhancing cross-purchase ability, it will be a crucial milestone for improving unit economics."

• From a mid-term perspective, some analysts emphasize that 「robust cash flow from retail and logistics provides capability radius for new business, but structural pressure from subsidy and employment costs requires longer time optimization," urging to observe if management’s clear attitude towards "vicious subsidies" translates into sustained investment intensity tightening.

In summary, the dominant opinion is cautiously pessimistic, emphasizing the pace of profit recovery and execution strength and speed of subsidy structure optimization. If the revenue maintains double-digit growth this quarter while EBIT and adjusted earnings per share contraction narrows, it will serve as a key signal for market sentiment to improve from cautious to neutral; if subsidy structure and cross-flow efficiency see no substantive progress, short-term pressure is likely to continue.