Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by, and welcome to Pinduoduo second quarter 2022 earnings conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. There will be a presentation followed by a question and answer session. At which time if you wish to ask a question, you need to press star one one on your telephone. I must advise you that this conference is being recorded today. I'd now like to hand the conference over to your host today, Mr. Chen Pang. Sir, please go ahead.
Thank you, operator. Hello, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. My name is Chen Pang, and I will help host the earnings call. Pinduoduo earnings release was distributed earlier and is available on our website at investor.pinduoduo.com, as well as through GlobeNewswire services. Before we begin, I would like to refer you to our safe harbor statement in the earnings press release, which applies to this call, as we will make certain forward-looking statements. Also, this call includes discussions of certain non-GAAP financial measures. Please refer to our earnings release, which contains a reconciliation of non-GAAP measures to GAAP measures. Joining us today on the call are Lei Chen, our Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Liu Jun, our VP of Finance. Lei will make some general remarks on our performance for the past quarter and our strategic focus.
Jun will then take us through our financial results for the second quarter ended June 30, 2022. During the Q&A session, Lei will answer questions in Chinese, and I will help translate. Please kindly note that all translations provided are for reference purpose only. In case of any discrepancy between the original remarks and the translated version, statements in the original remarks should prevail. Now it is my pleasure to introduce our Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Lei Chen. Lei, please go ahead.
Thank you, Chen, and hello, everyone. Thank you for joining our earnings call for the second quarter of 2022. Let me start by giving a brief overview of our second quarter results. Our total revenue for this quarter was RMB 31.4 billion. This represents a year-over-year increase of 36%. We witnessed the resilience of China's consumption during the second quarter. After being temporarily affected in early part of the quarter, pent-up demand was released as things returned to normal, and consumer sentiment gradually recovered in the second half of Q2. Since mid-May, we launched several campaigns and distributed coupons to bolster consumer confidence. Such recovery in consumer confidence was also reflected in a positive reception for this year's June 18 Shopping Festival. During the June 18 Shopping Festival, we continued to focus on bringing our customers more savings and more fun.
We are encouraged to see consumers buying from a wide range of categories. For example, categories such as agricultural produce, FMCG, household electronics, and cosmetics all experienced strong consumer demand during the festival. Also, more and more brands are partnering with us, and many of them use our platform to launch their new products. These are signs that consumers and merchants are finding values in our platform. Having said that, we still have a long way to go before fully meeting our consumers' evolving needs. Our business activities and investments were affected during the last quarter, especially in the first half. Short-term external factors such as remote working and travel restrictions caused delays of certain projects, including promotional events and agri tech initiatives. Even though this might make the quarterly financials look better, the long-term prospects of our platform may be affected, especially considering the current industry dynamics.
Therefore, it has become more important than ever to step up our investments and build up our core capabilities. We must make every possible improvement and create value for our consumers, business partners, and the society. For consumers, we are constantly on the lookout for new unmet needs and iterating our services to address those needs. For example, during April, we saw a spike in consumer demand for fresh food, groceries, and daily necessities in Shanghai. To meet this demand, we set up a special section in the Pinduoduo app for residents to buy fresh foods and essential items, and have them delivered within 48 hours. From the initial 25 items, we quickly expanded the selection to around 300 products. From essentials like rice and cooking oil to diapers and hygiene products.
Given the surge in demand and limited logistical capacity, we also offered more delivery flexibility through the pooling of orders by housing communities. Here, we would like to take a moment to express our gratitude to the colleagues who work hard to ensure the operation of our platform in the past quarter. Their hard work served many consumers in their time of need, and we are deeply thankful and proud of their contribution. As things gradually return to normal, we also launched various events to promote seasonal agricultural produce. For instance, in late May, in response to consumer demand, we launched a campaign to help consumers discover and enjoy seasonal fruit from across the country. This event was well received by consumers. Sales of lychee surged 158% compared with a year ago, while orders increased significantly for other fruit such as watermelon, coconut, and grape.
Seeing consumer feedback, we rolled out a year-long fresh produce of China initiative together with Farmer's Daily. This initiative will introduce the unique characteristics of different agricultural specialties across the country to our consumers and contribute better income for local farmers. For merchants, we work closely with them to ensure stable supply, especially at the start of a quarter when the supply chain was affected. For example, we proactively provided traffic updates to help our merchants better plan and adjust their logistics. We also launched special campaigns and measures to help the small and medium-sized businesses and agricultural merchants on our platform. For example, our Duoduo Grocery operations quickly contacted local suppliers when we learned that farmers in certain regions were unable to sell their vegetables due to traffic disruption.
Within a short period of time, they managed to sell hundreds of tons of vegetables through our platform, directly helping farmers to avoid financial losses. To support our farmer merchants, we will continue to waive the sales commission of agricultural produce. As a technology company with its roots in agriculture, we firmly believe that technology can serve as a force for good. We see rural communities benefiting from agricultural e-commerce by new jobs and higher incomes. Young people now have the opportunity to start their own online businesses in their hometowns and be close to their families. These benefits are both economic and social, tangible and intangible. We mentioned before that we have trained hundreds of thousands of new farmers, supporting them to set up online businesses and helping their local communities to sell their produce.
In addition to farming, we hope to further unleash the vitality of the rural economy by starting the New Craftsman program. As with agriculture, we aim to help local artisans and craftsmen promote traditional crafts, build their brands, and widen their access to market. We also expanded our Duoduo Reading Month campaign to promote the love of reading among young students in rural areas. As of today, we have donated over 250,000 carefully selected books. We hope that through such efforts, we can do our part in contributing to a better future for these youth. To conclude, as we deal with change from quarter to quarter, we remain focused on building long-term intrinsic value and investing for the future.
We will stick closely to our core principles of benefit all, people first and more open, and stay committed to build a platform that serves as a force for good. Thank you. With that, I will hand over to Liu Jun.
Thank you, Lei. Hello, everyone. I will go through our performance in the quarter ended June 30, 2022. In terms of PNL, our total revenue in the quarter were RMB 31.4 billion, up 36% from RMB 23 billion in the same quarter of 2021. This was mainly driven by an increase in revenues from online marketing services and transaction services, offset by decrease in revenues from merchandise sales. Revenues from online marketing services and others were RMB 25.2 billion this quarter, up 39% compared with the same period of 2021. This was primarily due to increase in merchant activities as the result of a consumption recovery. As Lei has mentioned, we experienced a recovery in consumer sentiments in the latter part of this quarter, especially during the June 18 Shopping Festival.
Our transaction services revenue this quarter were RMB 6.2 billion, up 107% versus the same period of 2021. Moving on to costs and expenses. Our total cost of revenues increased 1% from RMB 7.9 billion in Q2 2021 to RMB 8 billion this quarter. Total operating expenses this quarter were RMB 14.8 billion, versus RMB 13.2 billion in the same quarter of 2021. The performance of certain projects, including promotional events and agricultural initiatives, as well as lower business-related expenses during the first half of the quarter, temporarily affected our overall expenses. As things gradually return to normal, we incurred more expenses in the second half of this quarter.
Our total non-GAAP operating expenses as a percentage of total revenues has declined from 52% in Q2 2021 to 41% in this quarter. Looking to specific expense items. Our non-GAAP sales and marketing this quarter, RMB 10.8 billion, up 8% versus the same quarter of 2021. On a non-GAAP basis, our sales and marketing expenses as a percentage of our revenue this quarter was 34%, compared with 43% for the same quarter in 2021. Our non-GAAP general and administrative expenses were RMB 164.7 million, versus RMB 213.8 million in the same quarter of 2021. Our non-GAAP research and development expenses were RMB 1.9 billion, an increase of 11% from RMB 1.8 billion in the same quarter of 2021.
The increase was primarily due to an increase in head count and the requirement of more experienced R&D personnel. Operating profit for the quarter was CNY 8.7 billion on a GAAP basis, compared with operating profit of CNY 2 billion in the same quarter of 2021. Non-GAAP operating profit was CNY 10.5 billion, versus operating profit of CNY 3.2 billion in the same quarter of 2021. Net income attributable to ordinary shareholders were CNY 8.9 billion, compared with CNY 2.4 billion in the same quarter of 2021. Basic earnings per ADS was CNY 7.06, and the diluted earnings per ADS was CNY 6.22, versus basic earnings per ADS of CNY 1.93, and diluted earnings per ADS of CNY 1.69 in the same quarter of 2021.
Non-GAAP net income attributable to ordinary shareholders was RMB 10.8 billion, compared with RMB 4.1 billion in the same quarter last year. Non-GAAP diluted earnings per ADS was RMB 7.54 versus RMB 2.85 in the same quarter of 2021. Now let me move on to cash flow. Our net cash flow generated from operating activities were RMB 19.4 billion, compared with RMB 7.4 billion in the same quarter of 2021, primarily due to the increase in net income and the changes in working capital. As of June 30, 2022, the company had RMB 119.4 billion in cash equivalents, and short-term investments. To conclude, profitability in the past quarter was mainly attributable to a few short-term factors that may not repeat in the future.
First, we saw good user engagement during the past quarter. As competition remains intense, we're not sure whether such engagement momentum will continue. Second, project performance and lower business-related activities affect our overall expenses in Q2. We view this factor just mostly temporarily in nature. In fact, we incurred higher expenses in the second half of Q2 when things returned to normal. Therefore, given that profits in the second quarter are mainly due to a combination of several short-term factors, we do not expect the profitability in the past quarter to serve as a benchmark for future quarters. Thank you. This concludes my prepared remarks.
Thank you, Liu Jun. Next, we will move on to the Q&A session. For today's Q&A session, Lei Chen and Liu Jun will take questions from analysts on the line. We are happy to take a maximum of two questions per analyst. Lei Chen will answer questions in Chinese, and I will help translate Lei Chen's remarks for ease of reference. Operator, we are now ready to take questions from analysts on the line.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin the question and answer session. If you wish to ask a question, please press star one one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. Participants are requested to restrict to two questions each time. Our first question comes from Kenneth Fong from Credit Suisse. Please go ahead.
I have two questions. First, on the second quarter growth rate, we noticed a very strong online marketing service revenue that records a strong growth of 39% year-over-year. This re-accelerates from the previous two quarters. What's the reason behind this quarter strong growth? The second question is on the brands. Can management speak more about the progress on bringing more brands onto our platform? We saw many brands participate in our 618 events. How did this help our growth for this quarter? What's your overall plan for the brand recruitment? Thank you.
Kenneth, I am happy to take your questions. First, about our revenue growth. Starting from the second half of May, we saw a trend of consumption recovery. We actively made efforts to facilitate consumer spending by offering various forms of promotion to help with consumption recovery. During this year's June 18 event, we saw many merchants as well as brands actively participating. We also saw solid demand coming from consumers. Given this background on our platform, many categories, including FMCG products, agricultural produce, consumer electronics, and cosmetics, these categories all had a decent growth on our platform.
In addition, we always try our best to satisfy consumer demand. This is inseparable from many of our team members' hard work during the past period of time. They worked very hard to help many consumers meet their essential demand. We are grateful toward our team's hard work during this process.
[Foreign language] 与此同时，其实我们也看到，行业内的竞争仍然激烈。在满足消费者需求的这个方向上，还是有很大的提升空间。正如我刚才提到的，第二季度因为外部环境的原因，我们整体的投入事实上是实际上是被动减少的，这其实并不利于培养我们长期的竞争力。
At the same time, we also saw that competitive landscape is still very intense. In terms of satisfying our consumers' needs, we have many areas that we can further improve. As I mentioned earlier, due to outside reasons, our overall investment activity during the second quarter was impacted. This is actually not beneficial to our long-term competitiveness.
[Foreign language] 我们需要加大努力，进一步地夯实核心能力。只有这样，才能为消费者和社会创造更多的价值。
Therefore, we need to further step up our efforts and also strengthen our core capabilities so that we can create more value for our consumers as well as for the society.
[Foreign language] 那么有关于你的第二个问题呢，就是关于品牌的问题呢，我们看到是说，我们平台上的消费者的需求，正在变得越来越多样化。那么每一个消费者呢，在不同的品类以及在不同的场景下呢，又会有不同的需求。因此呢，很自然地他们会需要有更多的商品和更多的选择。
As for your second question, on our brands, we see that the needs from our consumers on our platform are becoming more and more diversified. Different consumers, they have different needs in different product categories and across different consumption scenarios. Therefore, it is very natural for them to need more choices and more products.
[Foreign language] 我们的目标呢，始终是为了更好地服务消费者，那么给他们带来呢多实惠、多乐趣的购物体验。
Our goal is always to better serve our consumers and to bring them more savings, more fun, shopping experience.
[Foreign language] 我们相信，在服务好消费者这个方向上，平台、品牌和我们的目标，是一致的。所以，我们会继续地做好平台应该做的事情，并且在这一过程中，保持踏实和耐心的态度。谢谢。
In terms of how to serve the consumers, we believe that essentially the brand's goal and our goal are well aligned, that is to serve our consumers well. We would continue to focus on our own part and remain to be very down to earth and patient. Thank you. Okay, operator, we may now move on to the next analyst.
Thank you. Next question comes from Joyce Ju from Bank of America. Please ask your question.
Good evening, management. Thanks for taking my questions. My first question is related to the overseas expansion. Could management share some colors on the reported new initiatives in the overseas market? What's the latest status and in main target market, and what's the core value proposition of this new business? My second question is related to the transaction service revenue. Transaction service revenue continued to grow faster than the online marketing revenue this quarter. Also, we actually see it accelerated from the last quarter to a triple-digit year-over-year growth. May we know, like, you know, what's the reason behind?
[Foreign language] 我自己翻译一下我的问题。管理层晚上好，感谢给我这个提问的机会。我有两个问题。第一个问题是有关于最近媒体报道很多的我们即将上线的跨境电商平台，能不能请管理层跟我们分享一下我们在这方面的战略计划，目前的进展如何，主要的目标市场是哪些？我们的优势、目标和预算会是大概什么样子的？我的第二个问题是有关于我们的transaction services收入这一块的，我们看到这季度的这块收入呢，继续超广告收入的成长，比起上季度的话呢，也是进一步加速，现在已经看到了三位数的同比增长，能不能分享一下这个背后的动力是什么？谢谢。
Joyce，
[Foreign language] 晚上好。我先回答一下你的第一个问题，然后呢，Liu Jun可以回答一下你的第二个问题。那么有关这个出海啊，我觉得首先一点呢，就是我们是一家年轻的公司，那么呢，团队呢，也比较年轻。那么在过去的一段时间呢，大家都在不停地不断地成长。那么呢，在成长的过程中呢，我们也在持续地探索新的机会。
Joyce, let me address your first question, and I will hand it over to Jun to answer your other question. First on our overseas business. First of all, we are a young company with a relatively young team, and everyone is continuing to grow and searching for new opportunities during our growth process.
[Foreign language] 那么，海外业务呢，就是我们看到的其中的这样一个机会。那么，最重要的一点呢，是我们从中看到了创造用户价值的可能性。当然了，我们也看到了很多同行取得了不错的成绩，所以我们认为，这是一个值得尝试的方向。
Overseas business is one of the opportunities that we see and we also see that the possibility of creating a value in this opportunity. At the same time, we also see that many peers in the industry are achieving good results. We believe that it is a direction that is worth trying out for us.
[Foreign language] 那不过呢，我们不会简单地去重复别人做过的事情。重要的一点呢，我觉得还是从消费者的需求出发，去创造出自己独特的独有价值。
With that said, we will not just simply repeat what others have done in this field. What is important to us is that we will start from the needs of consumers and strive to create our own unique value.
[Foreign language] 那同时呢，我们也充分理解，那么海外业务呢，将会充满挑战，是需要不断地去尝试的。那么整个过程呢，不会是一蹴而就的。但是呢，我觉得在这个过程中呢，积累的经验呢，对于公司，对于团队都会非常有价值。谢谢。
At the same time, we are sufficiently aware that overseas business will be full of challenges, and it will require constant trials and experimentation. This process would not just happen overnight, but the experience gained along the way would prove to be very valuable to our company as well as to our team. Thank you.
Okay. Thanks for your question, Joyce. For your question about transaction services revenue. First, we always remain consumer-centric. Operating metrics and financial metrics are natural results from how we serve consumers. In the past quarter, because of consumption recovery, we had a good user engagement and transactions. This contribute to the revenue growth. In addition, for us, our business cycle does not always match exactly to our quarterly financial reporting cycle. We are not managing our business on a quarterly basis. It is common to see fluctuations between quarters. We remain focused on serving customers better and investing to create long-term value. Thank you.
Okay. Operator, we are ready to move on to the next analyst on the line.
Thank you. Our next question comes from Thomas Chong from Jefferies. Please ask your question.
[Foreign language] 管理层晚上好，感谢接受我的提问。我的第一个问题是关于成本增效的，在全球宏观环境不明朗的情况下，看到互联网公司对成本控制都做出了不少积极的举措，想问一下管理层对这方面的想法，还有我们的战略。第二个问题是盈利相关的，看到第二季度的盈利做得比市场的预期好，我们对下半年的盈利的趋势可以分享一下吗？谢谢。
Thanks management for taking my questions. My first question is about cost control and efficiencies, given the macro uncertainties right now, and we are seeing a lot of Internet companies exercising sort of cost control. Just want to get some color from management about our cost control strategies. My second question is about our profitability. Given the second quarter earnings comes in better than market expectations, how should we think about the profitability trend in the second half? Thank you.
Hi Thomas, so let me address your first question. First of all, I believe that we are still in the development stage, not the stabilized stage. At this point in time, we still have a long way to go and a lot of work to do to serve our consumers well. As a part of our development, to constantly satisfy our consumer demands would take a lot of patience. Not only do we need to constantly explore, but we also need to seize the key opportunities and also make the relevant investments. In the past quarter, and especially during the first half of the second quarter, our team's investment activity was impacted.
During the short term, this might bring about decent financial results. If we look at it with a long-term perspective, this actually weakens our competitiveness. Therefore, looking ahead, we would always think about the long term, and we would remain very committed to investing for the future. We need to further strengthen our core capabilities and to continue to focus on investing into the fields of agriculture and R&D over the long term in order to create value for our consumers as well as for the society. This would support our long term and high quality development. This is my thinking on our overall strategies and I hope it addressed your first question.
Okay, this is Liu Jun. Thanks Thomas. I will take your second question. For your second question about profits. Well, as mentioned before, we have not changed our strategy on to the focus on profitability. For the past quarter alone, our profitability was mainly attributable to a number of external factors which are mostly short term or one-off nature. On the revenue side, we saw a good level of user engagement and consumption, which are mostly boosted by consumption recovery. At the same time, we still face very intense competition. For the expense side, factors such as project delays and decrease in business-related activities lead to the short-term impact in our Q2 expenses. To sum up, this quarter's profitability is due to short-term factors combined.
It is not a good benchmark for future reference, and this is our view on profitability. Thank you.
Operator, we're ready to move on.
Our next question comes from Bai Yang from CICC. Please ask your question.
[Foreign language] 好的。谢谢管理层，我有两个问题。第一个是有关多多买菜。我们其实看到在社区团购领域的增长好像没有之前那么快了，同时我们也看到行业上有些公司开始控制支出，也更加关注优益。想问一下，就是拼多多是不是也在关注效率方面的这样的一个提升？以及如果我们看多多买菜的财务提升，对于这个季度整体的财务有什么样的帮助？然后我第二个问题呢，其实也是有关费用率。随着我们的收入的进一步增长呢，经营杠杆的这个作用还是持续发挥出来呢。我看到这个季度的费用率也下降到了47%，那么我们是否可以预计这种经营杠杆的这样的一个效用是可以持续的？同时我们观察到公司在收入上有非常好的增长，我们是怎么在兼顾增长的这个同时，做到费用一个这么好的优化。我自己来翻译一下。
Uh, thanks management for taking my question. My first question is about Duoduo Grocery. We think that Duoduo Grocery is reaching a relatively steady growth state and players started to care about loss reduction and unit economics. Can management share some color on the future prospect of Duoduo Grocery? Do we also care more about the efficiency measures? Also how will the increase in Duoduo Grocery's financial leverage contribute to the firm-level margin this quarter? My first question is also regarding the operating expense ratio. As the company's revenue continues to grow and the operating leverage continues to play its role, the company's expense ratio has dropped to 47%. Should we expect the situation to be sustainable? Meanwhile, we recorded a 36% year-over-year growth in revenue. Could management comment on how we manage to optimize expense while also maintaining strong growth? Thank you.
Bai Yang
[Foreign language] 晚上好。我先说一下多多买菜吧。就是从战略上来说，我们一直认为，多多买菜呢，其实是我们平台业务的一个自然延伸，那么也是呢，我们发挥自身这种农业特色来更好地服务消费者一个非常非常重要的组成部分。这是一个我们会耐心投入的项目。这个执行战略呢，是不会受到外部的短期的变化的影响。
Hi, Bai Yang. Let me talk a little bit about Duoduo Grocery first. First, from a strategic point of view, Duoduo Grocery is a natural extension from our platform. In terms of how we are able to leverage our value proposition in terms of agriculture to better serve consumers, it also plays a very important role. This is the project that we would patiently invest into. This strategy will not be impacted by external short-term changes.
Since we introduced Duoduo Grocery in the second half of 2020, we have also seen that in the areas of matching localized demand and localized supply, as well as in the area of fulfillment, this service can provide consumers with a fresher, more affordable and more convenient agricultural products.
It can create tangible value for consumers.
[Foreign language] 那同时呢，我们也看到了这项业务呢，仍然有很多可以提升的地方。那比如说呢，如何更有效地进行供需匹配，发掘优质的货源
[Foreign language] 如何进一步地优化配送体系，提升预约服务质量等等。我们依然在不停地做这个调整和提升。我们这一切呢，都是为了争取呢，给消费者带来更好的体验。
At the same time, for our total grocery service, we also see many areas that we can improve. To give you some examples here, how to match supply and demand more efficiently, how to secure more quality products and produce, how to better optimize the distribution network and to further improve our fulfillment service quality. Just to name a few here. We are still constantly adjusting and improving. All this is to make effort to bring better service experiences to our consumers.
[Foreign language] 一直以来，我们都是坚持消费者导向，做项目首先是为消费者创造价值。这一点是始终没有改变的。具体的财务指标，其实是服务消费者这一结果的体现。谢谢。
We have always remained consumer centric and would remain to be so. Our top priority is to create value for our consumers, and this would never change. As for the financial metrics, they are our result and a reflection of how well we serve our consumers. Thank you.
Okay, thanks, Bai Yang. On your question on operating expenses trend. Well, our total operating expenses as a percentage of revenue decreased to 47% this quarter, as you just mentioned. I want to point out here, many short term factors such as project delays and lower business activities caused such decrease, so it is unlikely to continue. In fact, as things gradually went back to normal, expenses during the second half of the quarter actually increased compared to the first half. The Q2 quarterly expenses may not be a good benchmark. Also, just as Lei previously mentioned, we believe Pinduoduo is still in the development stage. Such impact on our investment is not good for us from business perspective. Competition is still intense, so we need to continue to invest. Hope it addresses your question. Thank you.
Hi operator, we may now take questions from the next analyst on the line.
Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Natalie Wu from Haitong International. Please ask your question, Natalie.
[Foreign language] 晚上好，谢谢管理层接受我的提问。我有两个问题。第一个，想问一下咱们现在内部对各个业务投入的战略优先级的看法。从雷总您接任CEO以来，已经一年半的时间了，也提出百亿农业的这个项目一年半了，我们看相应的费用好像一直没太多体现。同时，下半年我们看到外界情况有一些变化，比如说疫情的影响逐渐结束，消费者信心逐渐恢复，再比如说直播电商的压力也逐渐消退了，咱们几率的增速也显著快于行业，利润率也非常好。咱们也说了下半年要多花点钱在平台上，但也还是说了咱们还要继续投钱在农业和R&D上。所以就想了解一下，现在这个时间点上，咱们对各条业务线在下半年投入方面的战略优先级的看法，包括像这个平台的self marketing、农业的R&D，还有新的出海这些，怎么一个排序？好，这是第一个。 第二个的话，就是看到咱们的账上在二季度末都有超过CNY 1,000亿的现金了。我们也看到其他的一些公司也都在用自己的像分红、回馈股东，比如说像分红、回购这些的。就想了解一下咱们有没有类似的一个计划。
Let me translate myself. Thanks for taking my question. I have two. First one is regarding the development priorities. It has been some time since later on your leadership transition has started to shift more towards the agriculture program and R&D, but we haven't seen much material impact in terms of the income statement generated from the RMB 10 billion agriculture program. Just wondering, have such priorities changed? Should we expect a change when external factors are different currently? For example, as consumer sentiment improves, will you prioritize again on a platform related self marketing? What are your current key priorities? To bring PDD to the next level would be great that if we can get a sense regarding your internal strategic priorities for platform e-commerce, agriculture, and maybe the new initiatives related with overseas expansion.
Also, you have a strong balance sheet with over RMB 100 billion in terms of cash. We have seen some peers have introduced plans to redistribute value to shareholders. Just wondering, does PDD have similar plans under consideration? Thank you.
Hi, Natalie. Let me address your question on priorities for us. First of all, we need to look at on which we base our business and from which we start our business. We are dedicated to serving the rapidly evolving consumer needs. Our development is inseparable from the support from our consumers. This is our duty as a company to serve consumers well. As our user base reaches the current scale, it is our focus to better serve them and also deepen their trust in Pinduoduo, as well as increase their mindshare. Toward this goal, we have shifted our attention more toward agriculture and R&D, and these remain to be our priorities.
We have also seen that the investment in these two areas can bring about a tangible value to consumers and the society. First, let's look at agriculture. In the realm of consumption, we are able to enable more efficient online transactions. We are able to let consumers enjoy fresher and more affordable produce. We also improved the distribution efficiencies through the use of technology in distribution. In terms of agricultural production, we facilitated the technology adoption and usage to help farmers improve yield. We also actively provided training to small agricultural merchants and producers to help them receive higher as well as a stabler income. In addition to that, by strengthening our R&D capabilities, we are also able to better understand consumers new demands and preferences.
To improve their shopping experience so that we can create more value for them. What is more, over the past period of time, I see our young team members growing up through their responsibilities. They ensure the stable operation of our platform. They also helped satisfy consumer essential demand and created social value in the process. We will create more opportunities for these team members to take on more responsibilities and grow. We are still in the development stage, so we need to continue to invest patiently and improve our team's capabilities so that we can better serve consumers. What I just mentioned are our top priorities.
Yeah. Thanks, Natalie. I will take your second question on cash balance. I think this is essentially on capital allocation. Well, given the current competitive landscape and challenges, we still have many areas to improve to help us better satisfy our consumers' demand. For example, our retail and R&D. We need to invest patiently in these areas. Meanwhile, I think different companies may be in different development stages. As we have mentioned, for us, we are still in the investment phase. We will continue to place more focus on these areas to generate long-term value. Thank you.
Okay. Thanks everyone for joining us on the conference call today. Due to time limits, we hereby conclude the call now. If you have any further questions, please do feel free to reach out to our team. Thank you and have a great day.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, this does conclude our conference for today. Thank you for participating. You may all disconnect.