China's Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. on Thursday beat market expectations for fourth-quarter revenue, powered by demand for its ecommerce and cloud services as lockdowns in the country's biggest cities forced offices to shift to remote work.

U.S-listed Alibaba shares, which have lost roughly a third of their value so far this year, were up about 2% in premarket trading.

The e-commerce giant's strong results come as Beijing extends support to its tech companies to avoid a hit from new COVID-19 outbreaks.

Demand for online services ranging from shopping to cloud-based products has skyrocketed in China as strict lockdowns prompt people to work, shop and keep themselves entertained from homes.

Revenue in the cloud computing division rose 12% to 18.97 billion yuan in the reported quarter. At the core commerce unit, its largest, revenue rose 8% to 140.33 billion yuan.

Overall, revenue rose 9% to 204.05 billion yuan ($30.35 billion) in the quarter. Analysts on average had expected revenue of 199.25 billion yuan, according to Refinitiv data.

($1 = 6.7240 Chinese yuan renminbi)