By CHEN Qirui

Chinese fast-fashion online retailer Shein, recorded a US$700 million (4.8 billion yuan) profit last year, down 36 percent from US$1.1 billion a year before. The company has turned a profit for the past four years.

Sources close to the company said Shein is planning an IPO later this year. The retailer's total revenue is expected to be close to US$60 billion by 2025.

Unusually for a Chinese company, Shein’s customers are largely based in the US and Europe, outside of Asia.

Originally named ZZKKO, Shein was founded in 2008 by Chris Xu in Nanjing. The company went through many reinventions before emerging in its present arrangement as an e-commerce fast-fashion retailer serving a largely Western clientele.

In the Global Unicorn Index 2022 Half-Year Report released by the Hurun Research Institute, Shein was the fifth with a market value of 400 billion yuan.

The fast-fashion house was behind ByteDance’s Douyin (TikTok), the world’s biggest unicorn; SpaceX, an American spacecraft and satellite communications corporation; Ant Group, owner of the world's largest digital payment platform Alipay; and Irish-American financial services outfit Stripe.