Two renowned e-commerce websites dealing with auction, eBay and Taobao.com, reported increase of Chinese clients by 2.8 million and 3.85 million in the fourth quarter of 2005, the Ministry of Commerce quoted figures from the two companies as saying.

As the Chinese people are celebrating the new year and the approaching traditional Spring Festival, more Chinese are doing their festival shopping online.

According to materials provided by eBay in China, the number of its users totaled 17.9 million by the end of 2005, while information from Taobao.com showed that its registered client number reached 13.9 million by the end of 2005, 9.89 million more than the previous year.

The total turnover of the Taobao.com reached 8.02 billion yuan (1 billion U.S. dollars) for the whole year of 2005, and that for the last quarter was 3.03 billion yuan, figures show.

Online shopping is especially popular with white-collar staff members aged between 30 to 44 since they are busy and have more purchasing power, the source added.

Source: Xinhua