Why Jumia Technologies Stock Soared on Thursday

Shares of African e-commerce company Jumia Technologies (NYSE: JMIA) soared on Thursday after it announced it's launching a gaming platform in collaboration with technology company Mondia. Jumia Games is now available to users of the JumiaPay app in five African countries, and the company plans to expand it into more markets in the coming weeks.

The press release regarding the new service first appeared on the Mondia website on Wednesday while the market was open. But Jumia's stock rise may have been delayed since it didn't appear on that company's investor relations page. In other words, it has taken a little while for the news to get around. But now that it's out, the stock is soaring -- up 15% as of 1:30 p.m. EDT.

Investors are cheering this news because it appears Jumia is following a game plan that's straight out of the playbooks of successful e-commerce leaders from around the globe. Just last year, it launched a subscription service similar to Amazon Prime called Jumia Prime in select markets. In Latin America, MercadoLibre is the dominant e-commerce player, and its Mercado Pago payments platform has proven popular. Jumia, following suit, created JumiaPay. And in Asia, there's Sea Limited, which used its growing video gaming business as a launchpad to get into e-commerce and mobile payments, too. And now, Jumia has Jumia Games.

Source Fool.com