Shares of e-commerce site Shopify (SHOP) fell over 4% in the afternoon of Cyber Monday as thousands of users and small businesses raised complaints that they couldn’t log in to their accounts on the retailer’s site.
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According to Downdetector, the downtime so far peaked around 11 a.m. EST, with over 4,000 users in the U.S. reporting their inability to access the site on the real-time outage monitoring platform. The incident comes on the biggest online shopping day in the U.S.
Shopify Investigates Downtime
In response to the development, Shopify said it was aware of the technical problems affecting the administrative interface — Shopify Admin — for store owners on its platform and was working to resolve the issue.
“We are continuing to investigate and apply mitigations for the issues with accessing Admin and POS systems,” Shopify explained on its website in its latest update on the issue. “Some merchants may also see an issue with POS checkouts, due to not being able to access POS systems.”
Shopify further emphasized that online store checkouts are not affected by the issue.
Will the Downtime Hurt Shopify’s Cyber Monday Sales?
The development could threaten Shopify’s ability to take a significant share of the $14.2 billion in sales expected to be generated by U.S. retailers at the end of Cyber Monday, according to Adobe Analytics (ADBE).
Cyber Monday marks the end of the four-day shopping spree by U.S. consumers, who each year hunt down heavy discounts on various products on e-commerce platforms. The event usually starts on Black Friday, with sales further accelerating on Monday as shoppers rush to snap up discount deals on the final day.
Adobe Analytics‘ data suggests that American consumers will spend about 6% more on online purchases on Cyber Monday this year, compared to the same day last year. Already, data from the same marketing analytics platform has indicated that U.S. buyers spent 9.1% more on Black Friday on November 28 — sales jumped to $11.8 billion year-over-year.
Is SHOP a Good Stock to Buy Now?
On Wall Street, Shopify’s shares currently hold a Moderate Buy consensus rating. This is based on 17 Buys and 10 Holds assigned by 27 analysts over the past three months.
At $179.56, the average SHOP price target indicates over 18% upside from the current trading levels.
