Research archive for AMZN

Along with their results, Amazon had some big news for us last night. Jeff Bezos is stepping down as CEO and will be replaced by Andy Jassy who was previously the head of Amazon Web Services. Under his reign AWS has become the star of the Amazon show.

Amazon is said to be in talks to buy podcast startup Wondery in a deal worth $300 million. Wondery's last funding round was in June 2019, where the company raised $10 million at a $100 million valuation. This was the largest funding round for an independent podcasting company at the time. Today Wondery is the last large independent podcaster.

You would be forgiven to believe that Amazon dominates the global online retail market. In reality, they are only prominent in 12 countries.

We are quite used to this by now, tech companies getting fined, especially in Europe. This time it was Amazon's turn to take the heat. The European Competition Commission said it suspects Amazon of violating antitrust rules by using data from third party sellers to boost their own products. Basically, Amazon was checking what items were selling best from their third party retailers and then selling those items themselves. Often the Amazon version would be top of the search list.

Hey ho, here is another company earnings report for you. E-commerce giant Amazon was out with third quarter numbers last night. As expected, they delivered some eye-popping gains.

Google's gaming streaming service called Stadia has been well documented in the media and in our daily newsletter. The service aims to become the 'Netflix of gaming'. Now Amazon have joined the race after unveiling Luna last week.

I have been following Amazon's foray into India very closely. I went to India in 2017 and it is quite obvious that online retail could explode there. Not to mention a population of 1.2 billion people.

Amazon reported a very good set of quarterly numbers, easily beating the streets expectations. This was thanks to more people shopping online and more businesses migrating to the cloud. The Seattle-based e-commerce giant has had to invest more money in its people and its supply chain to ensure worker safety as well as to alleviate supply chain pressures due to a big surge in demand.

Last week Amazon raised $10 billion in the bond market at a record low rate for corporate America. Included in the bond offering was 30-year and 40-year debt. The record low rates and long timeframe show how confident investors are in the long term future of the company.

On Thursday evening Amazon released its Q1 numbers. The company saw a 26% surge in sales, increasing to $75.5 billion for the first three months of this year. There has been a spike in demand for online e-tail, so much so that Amazon has had to hire an extra 175 000 people. In some parts of the world they have also had to prioritise certain orders, to make sure that people get their necessitates.

Amazon has just launched its 'Amazon Go Grocery' store. What makes the store special is that there is no need to go past a check out counter when you are done shopping. While you are walking around, cameras and AI keep track of what you are buying, and then when you leave the store, it simply charges your Amazon account.

I have more good news for you. Amazon shares jumped up by 10% after the company reported astonishingly good holiday trading season results last night. These numbers really underscored the benefits of Amazon's massive investment in its distribution network, and in the value proposition of the Amazon Prime offering.

We have already spoken about Amazon and their relationship with Indian powerhouse retailer, Future Retail. The company which has 1 500 stores and 350 million visitors a year. Amazon has a 4% stake in the business and will be holding Future's hand in their attempt to crack the Indian market.

I came across two articles talking about jobs that didn't exist a few years ago. The first, is a company that offers productivity sessions. You pay them to rent a desk for a period of time, where you have a specific task to compete. They will then check up on you during the session to see how it is going. Part of the service can include them taking your phone away from you to reduce distractions.

On Thursday night after the market closed, Amazon reported its Q3 numbers. It reported revenue of $70 billion, growing by 24% and beating estimates by $1.3 billion. On a profit side, EPS was $4.23, missing estimates by $0.26. Lastly, the guidance for their final and biggest quarter of the year was less than expected. Once the results hit the street, the Amazon share price dropped 9% in after hours trading. Thankfully, once investors had a chance to dwell on the results and have a good night sleep, things didn't look as bad on Friday morning. When the stock closed on Friday evening it was down 1%.