原声播报95：拼多多承诺将15亿美元未来利润投入农业公益项目

Pinduoduo Pledges $1.5 Billion of Earnings to Chinese Farmers

拼多多承诺将15亿美元未来利润投入农业公益项目

【文中生词】
rewind （磁带）倒回
crave 渴望
plunge into 投入
backlash 强烈抵制
strenuous 艰苦的


【词汇延展】
Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM) 资本资产定价模型
Debt-Service Coverage Ratio (DSCR) 债务偿付比率
Net Operating Income (NOI) 净营业收入
Price-to-Earnings Ratio (P/E Ratio) 市盈率
Public Limited Company (PLC) 股份有限公司


【单词详解】
soar
v. 激增
increase rapidly above the usual level

关联词汇
surge 汹涌
upsurge 高涨
tower 高耸；超越
zoom 急速上升

例句
His market share continues to soar.
他的市场份额不断高涨。

The eagle can soar without flapping their wings.
老鹰无需振翼就能翱翔。


philanthropic
adj. 慈善的
(of a person or organization) seeking to promote the welfare of others

关联词汇
philanthropist 慈善家；博爱主义者
humane 仁慈的
benevolent 仁慈的
eleemosynary 施舍的；接济的
caritative 博爱的

例句
Some of the best services for the seniors are sponsored by philanthropic organizations.
一些一流老人机构是由慈善组织资助的。

Will you follow Warren Buffet and Bill Gates in philanthropic pursuits?
你会追随沃伦巴菲特和比尔盖茨的慈善行动吗？


Well, moving on to some news on the ecommerce giant – that is Pinduoduo. For the first-time as a publicly listed enterprise, China’s biggest online retailer has reported a quarterly net profit.

Alright, give me those details on that Nandini!

So the company says its sales had soared just under 90% in the second quarter. That means the ecommerce player notched up roughly 23 billion yuan from sales in that period as well as a net income of 2.4 billion yuan. And this really marks a huge turnaround for Pinduoduo from where it was one year ago. After all, if we rewind to back then, the company had posted a net loss of nearly 900 million yuan.

But that’s not the only reason the online retailer has been making the headlines.

Oh really? Well, you can’t just say something like that and then not offer me those details which I crave.

This week the enterprise also announced that it would be giving 1.5 billion US dollars’ worth of its gains to a good cause. 

And when you say a good cause you mean?

Well, according to Bloomberg, Pinduoduo will be donating the money to a philanthropic initiative which focuses on critical needs in agricultural and rural areas. And, yes, in case you’re wondering the move has already gotten the greenlight from the company’s board. Now the company has not committed to paying up all this money in one go, instead it will rather keep steadily donating to the cause until it hits 1.5 billion US dollar mark. As Pinduoduo’s CEO put it in a statement, “This is an important and challenging task, which we will invest in patiently.”

So, why is this profit-making machine so eager to give away all that money it worked so hard – or rather it worked other people so hard – to earn?

Well, a clue may just lie in your question. So the answer isn’t really clear; but some may suspect that it’s an attempt by the company to clean up its image. Indeed, earlier in the year, the company was plunged into some serious controversy after the deaths of not one but two young employees. The first case involved a 22-year old woman who collapsed and died after reportedly being under pressure to work long works at Pinduoduo. Meanwhile, the second staff member, an engineer surnamed Tan, died in a suspected suicide, after leaping from a high-rise building. Tan’s roommate said that he had often complained about his overwhelming workload. Now, not long after these tragedies occurred, Pinduoduo received a lot of backlash on social media for its strenuous 996 work culture. As a reminder, that describes a culture whereby companies expect their employees to work from 9am to 9pm six days a week.

Now, aside from all of that, we should also bear in mind that other important factors could also be at play here. For one, China’s getting more concerned about tech giants and their potential anti-competitive and unfair business practices. And at the same time, Beijing has also announced its goal of common prosperity – that means wealth should be shared among everyone, not just among a few people. So, this could explain why Pinduoduo may be wanting to show that it’s “giving back”.