American Trust lessened its holdings in shares of Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) by 27.1% in the first quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 20,541 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock after selling 7,636 shares during the quarter. American Trust’s holdings in Amazon.com were worth $4,278,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.
Other large investors have also recently modified their holdings of the company. MilWealth Group LLC raised its holdings in Amazon.com by 79.0% during the 4th quarter. MilWealth Group LLC now owns 179 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock valued at $41,000 after acquiring an additional 79 shares during the period. Lifetime Wealth Management P.C. bought a new position in shares of Amazon.com in the fourth quarter worth $45,000. Elkhorn Partners Limited Partnership grew its position in shares of Amazon.com by 900.0% in the fourth quarter. Elkhorn Partners Limited Partnership now owns 200 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock valued at $46,000 after purchasing an additional 180 shares in the last quarter. Fairway Wealth LLC lifted its holdings in Amazon.com by 95.6% during the 4th quarter. Fairway Wealth LLC now owns 221 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $51,000 after purchasing an additional 108 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Prudent Man Investment Management Inc. increased its position in shares of Amazon.com by 87.7% during the fourth quarter. Prudent Man Investment Management Inc. now owns 229 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock valued at $53,000 after buying an additional 107 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 72.20% of the company’s stock.
Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades AMZN has been the topic of a number of analyst reports. Cantor Fitzgerald reaffirmed an “overweight” rating and set a $330.00 target price (up from $280.00) on shares of Amazon.com in a report on Thursday, April 30th. TD Cowen reaffirmed a “buy” rating and issued a $340.00 price target (down from $350.00) on shares of Amazon.com in a report on Wednesday, July 8th. Citizens Jmp reiterated a “market outperform” rating and set a $315.00 price target on shares of Amazon.com in a research report on Wednesday, July 15th. Morgan Stanley boosted their price objective on Amazon.com from $300.00 to $330.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, April 30th. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus set a $319.00 target price on shares of Amazon.com and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 30th. Fifty-seven investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have assigned a Hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $312.91.
Read Our Latest Research Report on AMZN
Key Stories Impacting Amazon.com Here are the key news stories impacting Amazon.com this week:
Positive Sentiment: Analysts continue to see Amazon as a leading AI beneficiary, with AWS growth expected to stay strong into earnings. Amazon Viewed as Leading AI Beneficiary, AWS Acceleration Supports Buy Rating with Price Target Unchanged at $310 Positive Sentiment: India loosened e-commerce investment rules for exports, which could help Amazon expand cross-border sales. India relaxes e-commerce investment rules for exports in win for Amazon Positive Sentiment: Amazon is adding games to Prime Video and integrating Luna, supporting its bundled services strategy. Amazon is bringing games to Prime Video Neutral Sentiment: Amazon reorganized its artificial general intelligence team, with layoffs framed as a reset to focus on higher-priority AI initiatives. Amazon cuts some jobs in its artificial general intelligence unit Negative Sentiment: A U.S. Senate panel is probing whether Amazon allowed Chinese influence to affect marketplace decisions, raising regulatory risk. Amazon Faces Senate Probe Over Alleged China Influence Negative Sentiment: Investors are questioning whether Amazon’s aggressive AI capex plans could pressure margins and earnings near term. Magnificent 7 Loses $767 Billion as AI Skeptics Dump Tech Stocks Insider Activity In other news, Director Jonathan Rubinstein sold 3,706 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, April 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $273.02, for a total value of $1,011,812.12. Following the sale, the director directly owned 74,948 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $20,462,302.96. The trade was a 4.71% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, CEO Matthew S. Garman sold 15,467 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, May 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $263.40, for a total value of $4,074,007.80. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 14,159 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,729,480.60. This trade represents a 52.21% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. In the last ninety days, insiders sold 140,425 shares of company stock valued at $37,715,464. 8.90% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.
Amazon.com Stock Down 4.6% NASDAQ:AMZN opened at $233.66 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27, a current ratio of 1.18 and a quick ratio of 1.01. The firm’s 50-day moving average price is $248.90 and its 200-day moving average price is $236.35. The company has a market capitalization of $2.51 trillion, a PE ratio of 27.95, a P/E/G ratio of 1.82 and a beta of 1.46. Amazon.com, Inc. has a 1-year low of $196.00 and a 1-year high of $278.56.
Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN – Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, April 29th. The e-commerce giant reported $2.78 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.63 by $1.15. The company had revenue of $181.52 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $177.28 billion. Amazon.com had a net margin of 12.22% and a return on equity of 19.92%. Amazon.com’s revenue was up 16.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the company posted $1.59 EPS. On average, equities analysts predict that Amazon.com, Inc. will post 7.75 EPS for the current fiscal year.
Amazon.com Profile (Free Report)
Amazon.com, Inc is a diversified technology and retail company best known for its e-commerce marketplace and broad portfolio of consumer and enterprise services. Founded by Jeff Bezos in 1994 and headquartered in Seattle, Washington, the company launched as an online bookseller and expanded into a global retail platform that sells products directly to consumers and provides a marketplace for third-party sellers. Over time Amazon has grown beyond retail into areas including cloud computing, digital media, devices and logistics.
Key businesses and offerings include Amazon’s online marketplace and fulfillment services, the Amazon Prime membership program (which bundles expedited shipping with streaming and other benefits), Amazon Web Services (AWS) which supplies on-demand cloud computing and storage to businesses and public-sector customers, and a range of content and advertising services such as Prime Video and Amazon Advertising.
Further Reading Five stocks we like better than Amazon.com Premium Retail’s Stress Test Is Separating Winners From Losers D-Wave Quantum or a Quantum ETF: Which Is the Better Bet? GE Vernova Just Sent a Mixed AI Signal to Investors Alphabet Crushed Earnings, But One Number Spooked the Market Want to see what other hedge funds are holding AMZN? Visit HoldingsChannel.com to get the latest 13F filings and insider trades for Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN – Free Report).
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Amazon (AMZN -4.57%) fell about 4.6% on Thursday, and the company itself didn't report a thing. Most of the selling traces to other companies' earnings reports, though a new Senate inquiry into the company's marketplace added to the pressure. Alphabet bumped its 2026 capital spending plan to as high as $205 billion on Wednesday, and Tesla told investors its own capital spending will exceed $25 billion this year. Big tech fell broadly on the news, with all of the "Magnificent Seven" megacap stocks trading lower.
Amazon got caught in that downdraft for a specific reason. It has an AI (artificial intelligence) spending plan as big as any of them, at about $200 billion in expected capital expenditures for 2026. Alphabet's guidance raise arrived alongside negative free cash flow, and together they reminded investors that these budgets can still grow. Amazon reports its second-quarter results on July 30. The market spent Thursday pricing in the possibility that its number moves meaningfully higher, too.
Image source: Amazon.
The concern isn't hypothetical. Amazon's free cash flow for the trailing 12 months had already fallen to $1.2 billion as of the first quarter. A year earlier, that figure was $25.9 billion.
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But the other side of the ledger is growing, too. Amazon Web Services, the company's cloud computing business, grew revenue 28% year over year in the first quarter to $37.6 billion. That was its fastest growth in 15 quarters, and an acceleration from 24% the quarter before. The spending is buying acceleration, at least so far.
The stock now sits 16% under its 52-week high of $278.56. And it trades at about 29 times earnings, arguably a modest multiple next to several of its megacap peers.
What could override Thursday's worry on July 30 is straightforward: AWS growth accelerating even more, and a capital spending plan that doesn't lurch higher.
Daniel Sparks has clients with positions in Tesla. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Alphabet, Amazon, and Tesla. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
Amazon is requiring that third-party sellers label any product images or videos that contain "AI-generated people" after New York recently passed a law mandating greater transparency around "synthetic performers" in ads.
The company informed sellers Wednesday of the policy change, according to a copy of the announcement viewed by CNBC. The policy directs sellers to tag images and any "A+ content," which refers to videos or other graphics on listing pages, with specific metadata keywords before they're uploaded.
"Recent legislation requires disclosure when images or videos in advertisements contain photorealistic AI-generated people," Amazon wrote in the announcement.
The New York law, which took effect last month, requires companies to disclose if "synthetic performers" are used in place of human actors in advertising. The legislation applies to "digitally-created media that appear as a real person." Governor Kathy Hochul described it as a "first-in-the-nation" law.
"Without notice that the content the public is viewing is not real, AI-generated synthetic performers and manipulated media can undermine one's ability to accurately distill fact from fiction," Hochul's office said in a release.
Amazon clarified in its announcement that the requirement doesn't apply to content featuring TV, video game and movie characters, or content that includes real people, even if they've been altered using AI.
The company said it will "add an indicator" to listings on its website, informing consumers that images or other content feature AI-generated people, "where applicable." It's unclear what criteria Amazon will apply when deciding when to display the label to shoppers.
Amazon didn't immediately provide a comment.
Amazon has embraced AI internally and it's increasingly infusing the technology across its portfolio. The company has optimized listing titles and details so they're more likely to be spotted by AI systems, invested in a recently rebranded assistant called Alexa for Shopping, and launched a feature that injects AI-generated products into its search bar in real time based on user queries.
More Amazon third-party sellers are using AI to generate text, images and other content for their listings, partly by using the company's tools.
Outside sellers are the engine behind Amazon's core retail business, accounting for more than 60% of goods sold on its marketplace.
There is no federal law requiring companies to disclose when advertising content has been created using AI.
States have taken steps to require greater transparency around AI content. Earlier this year, California began requiring large AI providers to embed watermarks in AI-generated images, video or other content.
Meta, TikTok, Pinterest and Google's YouTube have added AI-generated content labels to videos and images uploaded to their platforms. TikTok and Meta have recently been criticized for not adequately labeling ads that feature AI-generated influencers hawking dubious products, in some cases without a brand's knowledge.
TikTok has said it's taken steps to ban accounts that make misleading health claims, and Meta said it labels AI videos
Alphabet blows past earnings… capex jumps to $205 billion… why the “Lag 7” story is wrong… Louis Navellier’s “best market since 1999” Yesterday, after the closing bell, Alphabet (GOOG) reported its second-quarter results, and it was a whopper.
The tech giant blew past expectations, showing massive growth across its entire business:
Total revenue: up 24% year-over-year to $119.8 billion. Google search revenue: up 17%. Google Cloud (the AI engine): rocketed 82%. Operating income: up 30% while operating margins expanded to 34%. But the real issue going into the report was its capex guidance…
Would Alphabet maintain its commitments to AI infrastructure?
Yes – and then some.
Its capex increased 100% year over year to $44.9 billion. And it increased its already elevated full-year 2026 outlook of $180 billion to $190 billion, established in April, to $195 billion to $205 billion. And it won’t stop there…
CFO Anat Ashkenazi reiterated that 2027 spending will “significantly increase.”
Now, the downside of this is that the aggressive capex bill resulted in a negative free cash flow of -$5.85 billion for the quarter. This is weighing on Alphabet’s stock price today. As I write on Thursday, the stock is down 7%.
As has been the pattern in recent quarters, Wall Street is panicking about this colossal capex spend, fearing the returns won’t justify it. But beyond that fear, there’s no way to read this as anything other than a blockbuster performance. CEO Sundar Pichai summed it up this way:
Our AI investments are redefining what’s possible across every part of our business.
Alphabet down, AI trade up Going into last night, our technology expert Luke Lango, editor of Innovation Investor, gave us the playbook…
If Alphabet confirmed and/or raised its capex guidance, it would begin to firm up the AI infrastructure trade, which has taken a bath in recent weeks.
Sure enough, as I write on Thursday, though the Nasdaq is down about 2%, Western Digital (WDC) is up 5%, Marvell (MRVL) is 2% higher, and Seagate (STX) has added 3%. Other AI infrastructure darlings are also outperforming.
I reached out to Luke after the results, and he told me:
Alphabet’s results were stunning and a broad, strong rebuttal of “peak spending” fears which have weighed on the AI trade for the last two months…
So, they’re going to spend more. The 2026 capex forecast was boosted ~5% from $190B to $200B, its second hike this year already. That’s not a peak. That’s an acceleration…
We just got the confirmation we needed. The hyperscalers are going to keep spending. The party rolls on.
Bottom line: Alphabet is the first Magnificent 7/hyperscaler domino to fall this earnings season, and the numbers were fantastic – despite the stock taking a beating today.
But that prompts a question…
When will the “Lag 7” return to being the “Mag 7”? In recent months, as the performance of the Magnificent 7 stocks has underwhelmed, the financial media has come up with an alternative name – the “Lag 7.”
Through late June, the Mag 7 were down about 3% on average year-to-date, while the S&P 500 was up nearly 9% over the same stretch.
Why?
In a word: capex – the same issue that has Alphabet deep in the red today.
Investors have grown nervous that the hundreds of billions these companies are pouring into AI data centers won’t pay off fast enough to justify the spend.
As we’ve been covering here in the Digest, those investment dollars have been rotating out of the AI spenders and into the AI infrastructure suppliers, which have soared even as the Mag 7 lagged.
Now, this capex spend is a legitimate issue for Mag 7 owners to consider. But here’s what the “Lag 7” narrative has forgotten…
The Mag 7’s Q1 earnings were generally quite strong, and projected Q2 earnings are equally impressive.
Here’s FactSet:
In aggregate, the “Magnificent 7” companies have reported higher (year-over-year) earnings growth than the other 493 companies in the S&P 500 over the past several quarters.
Is this trend expected to continue in Q2 2026? The answer is yes.
For Q2 2026, the estimated (year-over-year) earnings growth rate for the “Magnificent 7” companies is 31.1%.
On the other hand, the blended (combines actual and estimated results) earnings growth rate for the remaining 493 companies in the S&P 500 for the second quarter is 22.8%.
Thirty-one percent growth isn’t the profile of a group that’s “lagging.” It’s the profile of a group still doing exactly what earned it the “Magnificent” label in 2023.
Meanwhile, here’s what’s been mostly left out of the “Lag 7” critique… It’s a one-sided read.
It focuses almost entirely on what the hyperscalers are spending through the lens of “the returns won’t justify it.”
But what if they do? What if Wall Street just needs to take a deep breath and relax?
It’s worth remembering that investors have been wrong about this exact question before. The cloud buildout of the 2010s drew the same kind of margin anxiety at the time – and it went on to become one of the more durable profit engines in corporate history.
I dug up a Wall Street Journal article from 2014 titled “Google, Amazon and Microsoft’s Costly Spending War” that noted “being a tech giant ain’t cheap,” and then quoted Bernstein Research analyst Carlos Kirjner:
Google’s remarkable capex increase over the last year has raised concerns among investors.
Other articles from that period highlighted the anxious handwringing of investors due to the massive capex spend.
Sound familiar?
And how’d that turn out? Well, when Amazon (AMZN) finally unbundled Amazon Web Services’ financial reporting in early 2015, Wall Street began to change its tune. Rather than a money pit, AWS was revealed to be a massive, highly efficient business generating billions in high-margin software revenue
This doesn’t guarantee AI capex plays out the same way. The scope of the capex spending today is on a completely different level.
Still, it’s a reminder that cries of “We’re spending too much” today could turn into “Wow! What foresight and vision!” tomorrow.
This is what we’ll be tracking. But history suggests that, when in doubt, we should give these Mag 7 management teams the benefit of the doubt.
But the good news doesn’t stop with Big Tech Let’s circle back to the FactSet quote from a moment ago.
Did you catch this?
On the other hand, the blended (combines actual and estimated results) earnings growth rate for the remaining 493 companies in the S&P 500 for the second quarter is 22.8%.
That figure isn’t just solid – FactSet notes it would mark the strongest growth the “other 493” have posted since Q4 2021.
And the trend is expected to broaden even further as the year goes on…
FactSet projects that by Q4 2026, the other 493 companies will actually outgrow the Mag 7: 25.3% versus 22.8%.
That fits with what we’ve been seeing in the “Lag 7” rotation: money moving into names that sit outside the traditional Mag 7 but are riding the same AI wave.
This helps explain why legendary investor Louis Navellier, editor of Growth Investor, is so bullish today…
The “best market environment since 1999” Let’s go straight to Louis:
The second quarter was the best-performing quarter for the NASDAQ and S&P 500 in six years…
I believe this is the best market environment we have seen since 1999…
In fact, I believe the current AI boom could ultimately be even more powerful than the internet boom of the 1990s.
It’s important to understand that this isn’t Louis being a perma-bull. His optimism is anchored in economic strength.
He notes that GDP grew at a 2.1% annual pace in the first quarter. Growth cooled a bit in the second quarter, but it is set to reaccelerate in the second half of 2026. And Louis is calling for GDP to hit “at least a 5% annual pace” in Q3.
Back to the investment legend:
Economic growth is poised to reaccelerate. The AI buildout is still gathering momentum. And most importantly, corporate profits are accelerating.
That is why the foundation beneath this market remains solid…
An economic reacceleration would goose what’s already been a period of strong returns for the market.
For example. I’m looking at Louis’ Growth Investor portfolio, seeing returns including:
Broadcom, Inc. (AVGO): 363% Carpenter Tech. (CRS): 212% EMCOR Group (EME): 249% Quanta Services (PWR): 421% And if Louis is right, these are the kinds of stocks that have more room to climb as the hyperscalers continue spending.
If you’d like Louis’ help in finding tomorrow’s triple-digit winners as this “best market environment since 1999” continues, click here to learn about joining him in Growth Investor.
But what about the AI bubble? Let me push back on all this optimism with a critique I’ve made in recent years…
It’s expensive.
Uber bears put it more dramatically: “We’re so overvalued today that we’re on the verge of a catastrophic crash that will put the dot-com crash to shame!”
But here’s the thing about all that capex from the hyperscalers…
It’s growing earnings so quickly that forward-looking valuations have been coming down significantly. This requires us to reassess the market’s overall price tag.
To do this, let’s use the forward P/E ratio: it compares today’s prices to forecasted earnings over the next 12 months.
According to FactSet, the S&P 500 has a forward P/E ratio of about 20.
Is this an egregious “super bubble that must pop” valuation?
No.
Over the last decade, the average forward P/E has been 19.
At 20, the market is slightly more expensive than usual, but nowhere near a runaway, terrifying bubble. For comparison, during the Dot-Com crash of 2000, this number pushed past 23.
Plus, this relatively high price tag of 20 is distorted by just a few massive tech giants. If you strip away those top heavyweights and look at the other 490+ stocks in the S&P 500, the rest of the market is trading at a much cheaper, more normal historical average of around 16 to 17.
Yes, you might want to diversify some of your portfolio away from higher-valuation tech into lower-valuation sectors. But that would be more of a rebalancing rather than a panicked “escape the bust” reaction.
One final reason for confidence… As we’ve just looked at, robust earnings growth is the solution to high valuations. So, how are earnings growth rates shaping up as we look ahead?
Back to FactSet:
For the second quarter, S&P 500 companies are reporting year-over-year growth in earnings of 24.7% and year-over-year growth in revenues of 12.8%.
For Q3 2026, analysts are projecting earnings growth of 27.0% and revenue growth of 10.8%.
For Q4 2026, analysts are projecting earnings growth of 24.6% and revenue growth of 10.4%.
For CY 2026, analysts are projecting earnings growth of 24.5% and revenue growth of 10.9%.
With numbers like this, Louis’ optimism about today’s market opportunities makes far more sense.
Back to the legendary investor:
Please – pinch yourself. You are not dreaming. The opportunity is real, folks.
It is time to grow and prosper.
Again, for Louis’ help, click here to learn about joining him in Growth Investor.
We’ll keep tracking the rest of the hyperscalers reports as they roll in over the next two weeks. But so far, so good for the AI trade.
Amazon (AMZN, Financials) is the e-commerce and cloud computing giant now under scrutiny by the U.S. Senate for suspicions that Chinese influence had a role in decisions made about its online marketplace.
A source citing people involved in the inquiry said Republican aides on the Senate Small Business Committee said they uncovered evidence of potential negligence related to China-based activities.
The investigation comes after reports that Amazon employees in China were allegedly selling favors to merchants who wanted to get better treatment on the platform.
One inventor told committee researchers that an intermediary promised to leverage connections with Amazon workers in China to assist fix marketplace problems in exchange for money.
The allegations challenge Amazon's control of third-party merchants, which constitute around 60% of the products sold on the platform.
Some shops have complained for years about unexpected suspensions, inconsistent enforcement and difficulty appealing penalties. Those challenges produced the need for middlemen who say they have access to internal decision-making.
The probe comes on top of wider regulatory challenges facing Amazon, including antitrust claims and allegations of deceptive business practices. The corporation has denied any misconduct in those cases.
Now investors will watch to see if the Senate committee would seek testimony, documents or policy changes from Amazon.
Big tech companies and spending on artificial intelligence and its infrastructure have been one of the biggest stories in the stock market this year, ever since Amazon (AMZN -4.53%), Alphabet (GOOG -6.68%) (GOOGL -6.80%), Microsoft, and Meta Platforms disclosed plans to spend $700 billion on capital expenditures this year.
Of that, Amazon was the biggest spender at $200 billion, with Alphabet close behind at $185 billion. But in the company’s second-quarter earnings call with analysts, Alphabet executives announced plans to join Amazon in the $200 billion club, spending its capex primarily on servers, connectivity, storage, and memory for data centers.
Alphabet stock fell 6% the next day. Will Amazon also raise its capex spending when it reports earnings on July 30? And just as importantly, will Amazon stock face the same fate as Alphabet?
Image source: Amazon.
Why is Alphabet raising capex?Alphabet, the parent company of Google, spent $44.9 billion on capex in the second quarter, with 60% of that on servers and 40% on data centers and networking equipment. It had previously projected full-year capex to be in a range of $180 billion to $190 billion; it now anticipates spending between $195 billion and $205 billion.
“We're still in a supply constraint environment. I think we've said this now for multiple quarters in a row, we are seeing very strong demand, both from external cloud customers as well as across the business. Our goal is to invest as long as we see an attractive return on that investment,” CFO Anat Ashkenazi said.
In short, Alphabet says that demand is outpacing computing capacity, even though Alphabet is accelerating its spending.
Overall earnings for Alphabet were exceptionally strong, with revenue of $119.79 billion, up 24% from a year ago. Google Cloud revenues were $24.76 billion, up 82% from a year ago.
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How likely is it for Amazon to also raise capex?I believe it’s very likely. First, consider that Amazon is a much larger cloud provider than Alphabet. Amazon Web Services has the greatest global share of the cloud computing market at 28%, followed by Microsoft at 21% and Google Cloud at 14%.
Second, Amazon has been very public and bullish about its capex. In a letter to shareholders in April, CEO Andy Jassy posted a lengthy statement on Amazon’s website justifying the company’s planned spending and saying it would be a “meaningful leader” in AI.
We’re not investing approximately $200 billion in capex in 2026 on a hunch. The recent OpenAI commitment (over $100 billion) is an example of this, but there are several other customer agreements completed (and unannounced), or deep in process. Of the AWS capex we expect to spend in 2026, much of which will be monetized in 2027-2028, we already have customer commitments for a substantial portion of it. And third, there are indications that major hyperscalers are accelerating their AI spending. BNP Paribas analyst Stefan Slowinski recently predicted in an investor report that Microsoft, the No. 2 cloud computing company by market share, would spend a whopping $262 billion on capex in its 2027 fiscal year. (Microsoft reports its fiscal fourth quarter and full year 2026 earnings on July 29, but the company had previously disclosed $104.3 billion in capex spending through its first three quarters.)
What to expect from Amazon’s earningsFirst, I would be shocked if Amazon did not increase its projected capex, but I also expect the market to react poorly because of it. Investors are very focused on the pressure big tech’s capex spending is putting on free cash flow, and I understand why there are concerns that Alphabet, Amazon, and the rest won’t be able to realize a profit from all this spending.
But as Jassy points out, Amazon isn’t spending blindly. As long as Amazon’s spending and planned investment are backed by customer commitments and the demand for more computing power exists, then Amazon looks to be a long-term winner. Any dip in the stock following earnings could be an appealing opportunity to acquire more shares.
Amazon.com Inc. AMZN shares fell about 4% in trading on Thursday after a report said a US Senate panel is investigating whether the company allowed China to exert undue influence over its online marketplace.
According to Bloomberg, Republican staff members on the Senate Small Business Committee have been examining potential “Amazon negligence related to Chinese influence” and have uncovered “compelling evidence,” citing committee correspondence and interviews.
The reported investigation adds to Amazon’s existing regulatory challenges, including antitrust lawsuits and allegations of deceptive business practices, both of which the company has denied.
The latest inquiry expands scrutiny of the e-commerce giant beyond domestic competition issues to its international marketplace operations.
The congressional investigation follows a Bloomberg report describing an international bribery network involving Amazon employees based in China.
According to the report, some employees allegedly accepted payments from merchants in exchange for administrative favors and competitive advantages on Amazon’s marketplace.
As part of the investigation, committee researchers interviewed independent merchant Jack Nekhala, a Staten Island inventor who sells mattress sheet fasteners.
Nekhala said he shared recordings of conversations with an intermediary who claimed to have contacts among Amazon employees in China capable of manipulating seller accounts in exchange for payment.
Committee researchers were particularly interested in understanding how employees based in China could influence Amazon’s marketplace, according to Nekhala.
Another individual who works with Amazon sellers told Bloomberg that committee staff also requested referrals to additional merchants for interviews, although the person declined to be identified because they were not authorized to discuss the committee’s work.
Third-party sellers and broader regulatory scrutiny remain in focusIndependent third-party merchants account for roughly 60% of products sold through Amazon’s online marketplace.
According to the report, many sellers have long complained about unexpected account suspensions, arbitrary enforcement actions and limited access to effective customer support.
Some merchants have reportedly turned to intermediaries offering connections to Amazon insiders who could reverse suspensions or restore product listings in exchange for payments.
The latest investigation comes as Amazon continues to reshape parts of its business.
On July 22, the company confirmed workforce reductions within its core Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) division following broader layoffs affecting approximately 16,000 employees earlier this year.
Amazon said the latest cuts were intended to streamline operations and redirect resources toward projects delivering direct customer value and commercial impact.
Internal communications indicated that role reductions primarily affected teams within AGI Data Services and AGI Information. The company's AGI division includes work on Nova foundation models, custom AI chips and quantum computing hardware.
Wall Street analysts were broadly positive on Amazon before the development.
Citi analyst Ronald Josey reiterated a Buy rating on July 16 with a $325 price target. KeyBanc also maintained a Buy rating the same day, assigning a $335 price target.
According to TipRanks data, the broader analyst consensus remains a Strong Buy, with an average price target of $318.98, representing an implied upside of approximately 36.41% from current levels.
Index Dow Jones -0,92 % na 51739,82 b. S&P 500 -1,19 % na 7409,52 b. Nasdaq Composite -2,1 % na 25151,85 b.
Index Dow Jones odepisuje téměř procento pří výprodeji technologických společností. Mimo Alphabet klesá i Amazon (- 4,1 %) a Salesforce ( -3,5 %). Z indexu S&P 500 se mimo komunikační služby nedaří zbytné spotřebě, kde reportovala výsledky společnost Tesla (- 14 %).
Thermo Fisher Scientific (8,2 %) roste po kvartálním reportu. Mimo dobré čísla management uvedl, že společnost cítí oživení poptávky ve všech hlavních segmentech. Nejedná se přitom o pouhé doplňování zásob, ale i dodávání analytických přístrojů, jelikož divize Analytical Instruments vzrostla o 15 %. Tržby za minulý kvartál dosahují USD 11,99 mld. a společně se ziskem na akcii USD 6,03 překonávají očekávání trhu. Společnost rovněž navyšuje odhad celoročního zisku na akcii na horní hranu USD 25,33.
Smíšený pocit z kvartálních výsledků mají investoři Freeport-McMoRan (- 2,6 %). Společnost sice dosáhla na lepší ziskovost, než bylo očekávání a reportovala EPS ve výši USD 0,74. Meziroční nárůst prodejní ceny mědi dosáhl 40 %. Vyšší prodejní ceny tak kompenzují nižší objemy produkce, které u zlata dosahují 40 % a u mědi 18 %. Management snížil výhled prodeje v dalším kvartále kvůli pomalému obnovování těžby v indonéském dole, který by měl dosáhnout plnou kapacitu až v příštím roce.
Lockheed Martin (10 %) reportoval silné výsledky za uplynulý kvartál. Růst tržeb dosáhl 11 % na mld. 20,1 USD a zisk na akcii překonal na úrovni USD 7,94 očekávání. Management současně navýšil celoroční výhled a tržby posadil mezi USD 79,75 – 81,75 mld. při zisku na akcii 29,95 – 30,65. Nevyřízené zakázky dosahují historické maximum společnosti USD 230 mld.
Po včerejším uzavření trhu reportovala výsledky i společnost Texas Instruments (- 4,4 %). Růst tržeb meziročně dosáhl na 23 % a nad konsenzus se dostal i zisk na akcii ve výši USD 2,14. Management v dalším kvartálu očekává jeho další růst na USD 2,23 – 2,57. Provozní výsledky a výhled byl slušný, ale trh nadále vyrušuje výše capex investic, které omezuje volné cash flow.
Výsledky dále zveřejnila i IBM (- 0,5 %) a společnost Alphabet (- 6,6 %).
SK Hynix (4,9 %) stanovuje limit na celkový počet vydaných ADR, které se obchodují v USA na 2,5 % všech akcií společnosti.
Uber Technologies (- 2,15 %) propustil 10 % zaměstnanců v divizi Community Operations, která se stará o zákaznickou a řidičskou podporu. Společnost dříve propustila přibližně 23 % zaměstnanců HR. K zefektivnění provozu ji pomáhá umělá inteligence.
Blízký východ je nadále velmi turbulentní. Futures na ropu Brent jsou opět nad USD 100 při téměř 7 % růstu. WTI se obchoduje nad USD 92. Hútíové oznámili, že zaútočili na dva saúdské tankery v Rudém moři. Posilují ropné společnosti. Exxon připisuje 1,87 % a Chevron roste o 1,5 %.
Index S&P 500 -1,19 % na 7409,52 b. Nejsilnější sektory S&P Změna Nejslabší sektory S&P Změna Průmysl +1,8 % Zbytná spotřeba -4,9 % Energie +1 % Komunikační služby -4,8 % Zdravotní péče +0,8 % Nezbytná spotřeba -1,4 % Nejsilnější akcie S&P Změna Nejslabší akcie S&P Změna Allegion (ALLE) +13 % Tesla (TSLA) -14 % United Rentals (URI) +12 % Rollins (ROL) -9,3 % Lockheed Martin Corp (LMT) +10 % Dover Corp (DOV) -7,7 % Thermo Fisher Scientific (TMO) +8,2 % Globe Life (GL) -7,7 % RTX Corp (RTX) +7,2 % T-Mobile US (TMUS) -6,8 %
Marek Kameništiak
Fio banka, a.s.
Prohlášení
You don't need a lot of money to get invested in the market. I'm probably not the first person to tell you that. I won't be the last. Widespread access to commission-free trading platforms, decades of moving away from round-lot purchases, and the growing reach of brokers that allow buying fractional shares make it easy to put even $500 to work in a meaningful way.
Where should you go with the next $500 you have to invest? I have a couple of ideas. Amazon (AMZN -4.17%) and Celsius Holdings (CELH -3.76%) could be the best stocks to buy right now. Let's take a closer look at these two very different market opportunities.
Image source: Getty Images.
1. Amazon Amazon stock reports fresh financials a week from today. Circle your calendar, but this gives you five trading days to decide if you want to get into the country's largest company -- by trailing revenue -- ahead of its second-quarter numbers.
Amazon doesn't need much of an introduction. There are just four companies with larger market caps. There's a good chance that you're a current customer of the e-commerce and digital services provider. Growth has slowed at Amazon as its business matures, but it has started to pick up the pace lately. Its 17% top-line increase for its previous quarter was its strongest increase in net sales in four years.
You would think that Amazon would be rocking with momentum on its side, but the stock is up less than 8% over the past year. That is less than half of the market's return in that time. Amazon? A laggard? That's not likely to last long.
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A big reason for Amazon's acceleration is that Amazon Web Services (AWS) -- a top dog among cloud hosting services -- is consistently becoming a larger slice of the overall pie. The segment's net sales rose 28% in the first quarter, now accounting for 21% of Amazon's top line. More importantly, AWS delivered 59% of Amazon's operating profit for the quarter.
Great things happen when your biggest-growing business also happens to be pushing margins higher, current stock chart notwithstanding. Analysts see another quarter of 17% top-line growth when it reports after the market close next Thursday. They see earnings per share rising at half that clip -- up a mere 8% -- as Amazon ramps up its capital expenditures like the rest of the consumer tech giants.
A nine-figure budget this year to boost its AI profile may seem daunting, but Amazon's AWS is also a major beneficiary of the revolution. Even the online store that started it all is getting better and more productive as a result of its AI-first mindset. With double-digit percentage earnings beats in three of its last four quarters, another positive surprise next week could be the start of turning this recent laggard into a leader again.
2. Celsius Holdings Growth investors have a love-hate relationship with Celsius Holdings. They loved the sparkling beverage maker when sales more than doubled for three consecutive years through the end of 2023, as its namesake functional energy drink became a workout, retail, and social staple. They hated Celsius when growth slowed dramatically in the first half of 2024, going on to post year-over-year declines for three consecutive quarters until it acquired Alani Nu in early 2025.
Alani Nu gave Celsius a non-organic boost, but investors initially bid the shares higher because organic growth also started to turn positive. The combined company was gaining market share in the energy drink space on a pro forma basis, but that initial attraction faded quickly. Celsius has lost more than a third of its value over the past year, even as the introduction of Alani Nu has delivered triple-digit revenue growth in the last three quarters (and an 84% jump in the period before that).
How great was that game-changing acquisition? Celsius paid a net price of $1.65 billion in cash and stock for Alani Nu last year, compared to the acquirer's market cap of roughly $6 billion at the time. In the first quarter of this year, the Alani Nu brand contributed $368 million of the $783 million in revenue it posted. All of Celsius a year earlier -- before Alani Nu -- generated just $329 million in revenue. Can you believe Celsius scored this deal for a little more than a quarter of its market cap at the time?
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This is where the value investors have a chance to tap in. With the Alani Nu deal closing on April 1 of last year, Celsius has now lapped the transaction. Celsius did acquire the much smaller Rockstar Energy from its distributor last summer, but it's not really moving the needle. When the beverage stock reports second-quarter results in early August, it will be the first period since the first quarter of last year to be driven largely by organic growth. The market might like what it sees.
Growth will naturally slow now that we're on an apples-to-apples -- or carbonated orange water-to-carbonated orange water -- basis. Analysts see revenue growing 18% on a dip in earnings when it reports, but the bottom-line retreat should prove temporary. Those same Wall Street pros see revenue slowing to 9% next year, but on a 17% jump in net income.
Here is why I really like Celsius heading into its next financial update in two weeks: Celsius has routinely trounced market earnings expectations over the past year. In the last four quarters, the energy drink powerhouse has landed 93%, 52%, 37%, and 40% above Wall Street's profit targets. If it can land another beat, even just below the lowest of its past four performances, it would surprise the market with earnings growth as it works through the recovery in its operations. With Celsius now trading for just 14 times next year's earnings forecast, it could be too cheap to ignore. Put another way, this sparkling beverage company might be anything but flat in August.
Amazon announced on Thursday that it’s bringing games to Prime Video by integrating its Luna cloud gaming service into the streaming platform. Games including “Hogwarts Legacy,” “EA Sports FC 26,” “Indiana Jones and the Great Circle,” “Clue,” and “Taboo” will be available starting today on Fire TVs in the U.S. and U.K.
With this move, Amazon is hoping games can turn Prime Video into a one-stop entertainment destination, borrowing a strategy from Netflix, which has increasingly embraced party games over the past several years. Since Amazon already operates a gaming service, it makes sense for the tech giant to integrate it into its streaming platform.
Alongside third-party titles and cult classics like “Taboo,” the games library will also feature titles developed by Amazon’s own gaming division, including its “Courtroom Chaos” games and the co-op card battler “Masters of the Universe: Legends Unite.”
Until now, games on Luna were only accessible through the cloud gaming platform’s standalone app available to Prime members. Now, they’ll be available alongside Prime Video’s movies and TV shows.
Image Credits:Amazon Amazon says its vision is to remove the barriers to gaming and make it accessible to anyone regardless of their experience or budget. The tech giant says Luna is designed to bring gaming to a much broader audience by removing the need for expensive consoles or gaming PCs and making games as easy to access as movies or TV shows.
Prime members can now access the new “Games” tab on Prime Video and start playing on their TV using a controller or their phone.
“For a lot of people, games have been harder to find than they should be,” Jeff Gattis, general manager of gaming at Amazon, said in a press release. “Bringing Luna inside Prime Video allows Prime members to discover games more naturally, and if they see one they like, they click it and they’re in. That’s less time searching and more time playing great games included with their Prime membership.”
Amazon says it will add new games every month. The tech giant also plans to bring games to additional devices and countries in the coming months.
When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. This doesn’t affect our editorial independence.
Aisha is a consumer news reporter at TechCrunch. Prior to joining the publication in 2021, she was a telecom reporter at MobileSyrup. Aisha holds an honours bachelor’s degree from University of Toronto and a master’s degree in journalism from Western University.
You can contact or verify outreach from Aisha by emailing [email protected] or via encrypted message at aisha_malik.01 on Signal.
Wall Street expects a year-over-year increase in earnings on higher revenues when Amazon (AMZN - Free Report) reports results for the quarter ended June 2026. While this widely-known consensus outlook is important in gauging the company's earnings picture, a powerful factor that could impact its near-term stock price is how the actual results compare to these estimates.
The stock might move higher if these key numbers top expectations in the upcoming earnings report, which is expected to be released on July 30. On the other hand, if they miss, the stock may move lower.
While the sustainability of the immediate price change and future earnings expectations will mostly depend on management's discussion of business conditions on the earnings call, it's worth handicapping the probability of a positive EPS surprise.
Zacks Consensus EstimateThis online retailer is expected to post quarterly earnings of $1.82 per share in its upcoming report, which represents a year-over-year change of +8.3%.
Revenues are expected to be $196.85 billion, up 17.4% from the year-ago quarter.
Estimate Revisions TrendThe consensus EPS estimate for the quarter has been revised 0.92% higher over the last 30 days to the current level. This is essentially a reflection of how the covering analysts have collectively reassessed their initial estimates over this period.
Investors should keep in mind that an aggregate change may not always reflect the direction of estimate revisions by each of the covering analysts.
Price, Consensus and EPS Surprise
Earnings WhisperEstimate revisions ahead of a company's earnings release offer clues to the business conditions for the period whose results are coming out. Our proprietary surprise prediction model -- the Zacks Earnings ESP (Expected Surprise Prediction) -- has this insight at its core.
The Zacks Earnings ESP compares the Most Accurate Estimate to the Zacks Consensus Estimate for the quarter; the Most Accurate Estimate is a more recent version of the Zacks Consensus EPS estimate. The idea here is that analysts revising their estimates right before an earnings release have the latest information, which could potentially be more accurate than what they and others contributing to the consensus had predicted earlier.
Thus, a positive or negative Earnings ESP reading theoretically indicates the likely deviation of the actual earnings from the consensus estimate. However, the model's predictive power is significant for positive ESP readings only.
A positive Earnings ESP is a strong predictor of an earnings beat, particularly when combined with a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), 2 (Buy) or 3 (Hold). Our research shows that stocks with this combination produce a positive surprise nearly 70% of the time, and a solid Zacks Rank actually increases the predictive power of Earnings ESP.
Please note that a negative Earnings ESP reading is not indicative of an earnings miss. Our research shows that it is difficult to predict an earnings beat with any degree of confidence for stocks with negative Earnings ESP readings and/or Zacks Rank of 4 (Sell) or 5 (Strong Sell).
How Have the Numbers Shaped Up for Amazon?For Amazon, the Most Accurate Estimate is higher than the Zacks Consensus Estimate, suggesting that analysts have recently become bullish on the company's earnings prospects. This has resulted in an Earnings ESP of +0.16%.
On the other hand, the stock currently carries a Zacks Rank of #3.
So, this combination indicates that Amazon will most likely beat the consensus EPS estimate.
Does Earnings Surprise History Hold Any Clue?While calculating estimates for a company's future earnings, analysts often consider to what extent it has been able to match past consensus estimates. So, it's worth taking a look at the surprise history for gauging its influence on the upcoming number.
For the last reported quarter, it was expected that Amazon would post earnings of $1.6 per share when it actually produced earnings of $1.56, delivering a surprise of -2.50%.
Over the last four quarters, the company has beaten consensus EPS estimates two times.
Bottom LineAn earnings beat or miss may not be the sole basis for a stock moving higher or lower. Many stocks end up losing ground despite an earnings beat due to other factors that disappoint investors. Similarly, unforeseen catalysts help a number of stocks gain despite an earnings miss.
That said, betting on stocks that are expected to beat earnings expectations does increase the odds of success. This is why it's worth checking a company's Earnings ESP and Zacks Rank ahead of its quarterly release. Make sure to utilize our Earnings ESP Filter to uncover the best stocks to buy or sell before they've reported.
Amazon appears a compelling earnings-beat candidate. However, investors should pay attention to other factors too for betting on this stock or staying away from it ahead of its earnings release.
Expected Results of an Industry PlayerCarvana (CVNA - Free Report) , another stock in the Zacks Internet - Commerce industry, is expected to report earnings per share of $0.42 for the quarter ended June 2026. This estimate points to a year-over-year change of +61.5%. Revenues for the quarter are expected to be $6.96 billion, up 43.8% from the year-ago quarter.
The consensus EPS estimate for Carvana has been revised 0.1% higher over the last 30 days to the current level. However, a lower Most Accurate Estimate has resulted in an Earnings ESP of -0.17%.
When combined with a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold), this Earnings ESP makes it difficult to conclusively predict that Carvana will beat the consensus EPS estimate. Over the last four quarters, the company surpassed consensus EPS estimates three times.
Stay on top of upcoming earnings announcements with the Zacks Earnings Calendar.
Amazon’s founder reportedly sees Prime Video as the place to tout the company’s AI efforts.
Jeff Bezos has urged Prime Video boss Mike Hopkins to revamp the streaming service to make artificial intelligence (AI) a starring role, Reuters reported Thursday (July 23), citing four sources with direct knowledge of the matter.
That led to an in-house project called Lighthouse, which would give the more than 200 million people who use Prime Video a better glimpse at Amazon’s AI capabilities, which the company has spent hundreds of billions of dollars developing.
PYMNTS has contacted Amazon for comment but has not yet gotten a reply.
Reuters sources said Lighthouse is seen as a key part of Amazon’s efforts to boost its standing in the AI space amid competition from the likes of OpenAI and Anthropic. Other projects, like the long-running upgrade of Amazon’s Alexa voice assistant to offer more conversational responses, have produced mixed results, with that division still losing money, sources have told Reuters.
According to Reuters’ sources, the Prime Video project came after a presentation the streaming service’s executives made to Bezos last fall turned “contentious,” with Bezos unhappy that plans for an updated Prime Video did not effectively spotlight the service’s AI/personalization capabilities. This led the company to jettison its original plans and launch Lighthouse.
In other Amazon news, PYMNTS wrote last week about new PYMNTS Intelligence research showing that while Walmart continues to dominate when it comes to routine shopping trips — especially for groceries — Amazon is gaining in purchases consumers research, plan and have delivered.
“The findings point to a broader change in consumer behavior: Shoppers are more often choosing the retailer that best fits each purchase rather than just making purchases where it is most convenient,” the report said.
“That creates fresh opportunities for merchants that can connect physical stores, digital experiences and flexible payment options into one seamless journey.”
The research also found an “inversion of traditional retail logic,” PYMNTS wrote. Retailers have long seen the weekly shopping trip as the foundation for bigger purchases, though new data indicates that relationship has softened. Customers still turn to Walmart for day-to-day essentials, but are increasingly relying on Amazon for more deliberate, higher-value purchases.
“In other words, frequent store traffic no longer guarantees a larger share of discretionary spending,” the report added. “As shoppers become more comfortable moving between physical stores and digital channels, retailers have an opportunity to rethink how they connect in-store visits with online engagement, personalized offers and payment experiences that encourage customers to complete more of their shopping in one ecosystem.”
by Thomas Wilde on Jul 23, 2026 at 8:46 amJuly 23, 2026 at 8:46 am
Amazon will begin to fold its Luna cloud platform directly into the Prime Video app via the new Games tab, in an effort to get word about Luna to Prime members. (Amazon Luna promotional image) Amazon announced today that it has updated some versions of its Prime Video app to include direct access to its cloud-based Luna gaming platform.
The business goal is to solve Luna’s awareness problem and bring new users to the platform. Many Prime members don’t know the gaming service is included with their membership.
Consumers in the US and UK who have both a Prime subscription and a Fire TV can now launch Luna directly from the Prime Video app, where it can be found in its own dedicated tab in the UI. Prime subscribers who launch Luna in the app will get direct access to a library of both casual and mainstream “AAA” video games for no additional cost and without having to exit the app.
“Effectively, we relaunched last October, taking a bunch of the value of Luna that had been behind a paywall… We pushed it into the Prime membership, as a way of providing great value and trying to grow our business,” Jeff Gattis, GM of gaming at Amazon, told GeekWire.
Players on Luna can stream an assortment of games to their TV or browser via Amazon’s cloud servers, using a smartphone as a controller if they don’t have a compatible gamepad. Luna’s current library ranges from established mainstream hits like Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, Dispatch, and Fallout 4 to an assortment of casual-friendly exclusive titles like Amazon’s own Courtroom Chaos.
(Amazon Luna press image) Since that relaunch, Gattis said, the company has “basically 5x’d” its player base.
“The question for us is, how do you build upon that?” he said. “How do we let 200 million-plus Prime members worldwide know that they have this great benefit where you can play $70 games inside your Prime membership at no additional cost? One of our biggest challenges today remains that people don’t know the [Luna] benefit exists.”
While Luna was previously available to Prime subscribers via web browser and a couple of other types of smart TVs, it was a standalone service that required users to seek it out on its own. By shifting it into its own tab on the Prime Video app, Amazon’s hope is to drive up awareness that, well, Luna is there at all.
“It’ll start on Fire TV, but obviously our end state is to roll out to more countries and more devices, both first-party and third-party,” Gattis said. “Eventually we’ll be everywhere that Prime Video is.”
Dispatch, a viral indie hit from 2025 about office romance at a superhero agency, has been a big hit on Amazon Luna. (AdHoc Studio image) The integration of Luna with Prime could also potentially bring back the largely-abandoned practice of video game movie tie-ins. Fans of this summer’s Masters of the Universe reboot can watch the film on Prime Video, then switch to Luna to play Masters of the Universe: Legends Unite, a strategic deckbuilding game that’s currently exclusive to Luna. This kind of transmedia synergy used to be a part of every big summer action movie, but it’s largely fallen by the wayside since the 2010s.
Luna originally debuted in 2020 as a subscription-based cloud service. Subscribers could pay a monthly fee for access to over 100 video games, which they could play through their browser by streaming them from Amazon’s servers.
Back then, Luna was Amazon’s entry into what was shaping up to be a publisher-driven “battle for the cloud,” with companies like Google and Nvidia all launching their own game streaming services. Over time, however, the cloud’s impact on gaming hasn’t matched its early hype.
More recently, the component crunch has driven up the price of consoles and graphics cards, and that plays into Amazon’s bet on Luna.
Gattis said the cloud has been “technology ahead of its time,” in part because the industry aimed it at the wrong people, pitching it as a direct replacement for consoles and gaming PCs.
“That’s a heavy lift to ask somebody like myself,” he said. “I’ve invested both emotionally and financially in my Series X console and my 5090 graphics card. I’m happy.”
Amazon is catering to everyone else: players unlikely to buy a gaming PC or a current-generation console, let alone the next generation of gaming hardware at even higher prices. For the first time, Gattis said, there are “a lot more people who are going to think about the cloud as a viable alternative to $1,500 hardware.”
I keep hitting the buy button on Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN | AMZN Price Prediction), and Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) just handed me another reason to keep going. When a Mag 7 peer posts Google Cloud growth of 82% with nearly 90% of the Fortune 100 running Gemini Enterprise, that lights up the entire cloud category. The market leader in cloud is still AWS, and AWS reports next Thursday.
The Three Engines I Cannot Stop Buying My thesis is plain. Amazon is three compounding businesses stapled together: a retail and logistics rail that would take a decade to rebuild, a cloud franchise that just posted its fastest growth in 15 quarters, and an advertising business now clearing more than $70 billion in trailing revenue. Any one of them would earn a top-quartile slot in my portfolio.
Start with AWS. Last quarter it grew 28% year over year to $37.59 billion at a 37.7% operating margin, and Andy Jassy called it “our fastest growth in 15 quarters.” The customer sheet is filling up: OpenAI committed roughly 2 GW of Trainium capacity from 2027, and Anthropic committed up to 5 GW. Amazon’s disclosed AI and cloud backlog now sits at $364 billion, which is contracted revenue standing behind the capex bill everyone loves to worry about.
Second, custom silicon. The Trainium, Graviton, and Nitro chip business is at a $20 billion annual run rate, growing triple digits year over year. Every workload Amazon runs on its own silicon instead of buying merchant GPUs is a permanent boost to that 37.7% AWS operating margin. Alphabet is racing to match with TPU. Amazon is already there.
Third, Bedrock and ads monetize the same customer base twice. Advertising grew 24% year over year on top of a $70 billion run rate, while Bedrock lets Amazon charge enterprises for AI inference on the AWS bill they already pay. That is compounding revenue with almost no incremental sales cost.
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Why My Next Dollar Skips Alphabet I own some Alphabet, and Sundar Pichai’s EPS of $9.11 against a $3.0427 estimate was real. Here is what pushes my next dollar to Amazon anyway: Google’s buyback program was suspended in Q2 2026, its long-term debt jumped from $46.5 billion to $98.2 billion, and Search still carries the revenue mix. Amazon has three engines, no paused buyback conversation, and Google Cloud remains the #3 vendor chasing AWS.
The Risk I Own With Eyes Open Trailing free cash flow collapsed 95% to $1.2 billion because capex more than doubled, and long-term debt climbed from $65.6 billion to $119.1 billion with 2026 capex heading toward $200 billion. If AI monetization stalls, returns compress. Two facts keep my finger on the button: interest coverage of 35.17 and debt-to-equity of 0.37 mean this balance sheet can carry the bet, and the $364 billion backlog is already contracted against the spend.
The people running the company agree. On May 21, Andy Jassy bought 50,000 shares, AWS CEO Matt Garman added 18,196, and CFO Brian Olsavsky added 15,450. Polymarket now prices a 95% probability that Amazon beats Q2 earnings on July 30, with analyst consensus at $312.87 against a $244.85 close.
My money is going to the one company that owns the retail rail, the cloud rail, the ad rail, and now the silicon rail. My buy button stays warm through July 30 and long after.
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Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN | AMZN Price Prediction) stock is down 4% to $234.81 Thursday afternoon, cutting through what had been a relatively steady July trading range for the e-commerce and cloud giant. The move lands inside a broader tech pullback, with the NASDAQ 100 down nearly 2% on the day. Amazon shares now sit well below their 50-day moving average of $251.16.
The drop comes a week ahead of the company’s Q2 2026 earnings release on July 30, sharpening focus on AI infrastructure spending, AWS growth, and any hint of regulatory drag. Today’s slide reflects a confluence of catalysts.
AI Capex Jitters and a Senate Overhang The dominant driver is a sector-wide rotation out of mega-cap AI names after Alphabet‘s (NASDAQ:GOOGL) capex guidance hike this week. Alphabet stock is down 6%, and Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) shares are down 4%, as investors question whether AI returns will outpace ballooning infrastructure costs.
Layered on top are two Amazon-specific overhangs. Per a Bloomberg report roughly 17 hours old, the U.S. Senate Small Business Committee is investigating allegations Amazon allowed Chinese influence on its online marketplace. Republican committee staff said they found “compelling evidence” of Amazon “negligence related to Chinese influence,” though the cited committee email “didn’t cite any specific evidence.”
The probe stems from an earlier Bloomberg story about an alleged bribery market involving Amazon employees in China selling favors to merchants. Amazon declined to comment, and these remain allegations under investigation, not established facts. Separately, CNBC reported layoffs in Amazon’s artificial general intelligence (AGI) unit, framed by the company as a strategic realignment toward higher-impact projects.
Peers and Valuation Context The e-commerce peer group is trading softer but not dramatically so. eBay (NASDAQ:EBAY) stock is down 3%, and Etsy shares are down 2%, suggesting today’s Amazon move is more tech-and-regulatory driven than a broad consumer discretionary problem.
The valuation picture keeps Amazon roughly in line with its e-commerce peers. Amazon stock trades at a trailing-twelve-month P/E ratio of 28x, sitting between eBay stock at 25x and Etsy stock at 30x. For diversified exposure to Amazon, some traders use the State Street Consumer Discretionary Select Sector SPDR Fund (NYSE ARCA:XLY), though the fund is top-heavy. Amazon and Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) sit as outsized weights, so the ETF doesn’t provide extremely broad diversification.
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Bull Case Still Intact Into Earnings Despite the pullback, Wall Street remains constructive on Amazon stock into next Thursday’s earnings release. Bank of America reiterated a Buy rating on AMZN stock with a $310 price target, citing AI-driven AWS acceleration and expected Q2 revenue of $198.8 billion. The consensus analyst target sits near $313, with a Moderate Buy rating overall.
Amazon’s Q1 2026 setup supports that view. AWS grew 28% to $37.6 billion, the fastest pace in 15 quarters, and advertising crossed $70 billion in trailing revenue. Prediction markets currently price a 95% probability Amazon beats Q2 estimates.
Still, the bearish overlay shouldn’t be overlooked. Amazon’s Q1 2026 capital expenditures hit $44.2 billion, and the company’s TTM free cash flow fell to $1.2 billion, a reminder of how much cash the AI buildout is consuming. Regulatory noise from the Senate probe adds another wild card.
What to Watch Investors can watch for whether Amazon stock holds the 200-day moving average of $234.35 into the close, and whether AWS growth, operating income guidance, and any capex commentary on the July 30 call reset the narrative. Maintaining modest position sizing into the earnings release may be the reasonable path here, given the regulatory tail risk sitting alongside a fundamentally strong quarter.
The key tension is straightforward: a strong fundamental setup (accelerating AWS, expanding advertising, and a Q1 beat) is running headlong into an AI-capex debate that just claimed Alphabet and Meta Platforms as collateral damage. Whether Amazon’s Q2 print reframes the spending narrative or reinforces it will likely dictate direction into August.
The takeaway for investors: today’s AMZN stock pullback looks more like sentiment and headline risk than a fundamental break. Traders comfortable with volatility may find the setup attractive, while longer-term holders should focus on AWS growth, operating margin trajectory, and management’s tone on the roughly $200 billion 2026 capex plan when Amazon reports next week.
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Tzv. hyperscaleři se v roce 2020 obchodovali s poměrem cen akcií k ziskům na akcii nad 40. Nyní jejich PE dosahuje něco nad 20, v roce 2013 to bylo asi 13. Detailnější pohled na tento vývoj a cyklus připomíná, že valuace mohou korigovat a měnit se příjemným a méně příjemným způsobem. Dnes se podíváme právě na to, co tento cyklus táhlo a k tomu přidáme pár úvah o budoucnosti.
Hyperscaleři tedy za posledních více než 10 let prošli z fáze poměrně nízkých valuací do fáze extrémně vysokých PE. A po nich přišla valuační korekce, která se zatím usadila u PE něco nad 20. Ukazuje pak vývoj posledních cca 5 let, že investoři to s optimismem u těchto akcií masivně přehnali? Jak jsem psal, PE může jít dolů více způsoby: Přes pokles ceny (tedy přes nižší čitatel), přes růst jmenovatele, tedy zisků. A řadou kombinací těchto dvou možností. Podívejme se na pár konkrétních čísel:
Čistá zisk Microsoftu se mezi lety 2020 – 2026 zvedl z cca 50 miliard na 125 miliard, Alphabet zaznamenal růst z 60 na 140 miliard dolarů, Amazon z 21 na 90, Meta z 30 na 70. Onen vývoj valuací byl tedy do značné míry ovlivněn tím, že zisky se cca zdvoj – ztrojnásobily. O tomto příjemnějším způsobu korekce valuací jsem tu přitom psal již před časem. Příklad těchto populárních a významných akcií a společností ukazuje, že to v praxi může skutečně „fungovat“. Bude tomu tak?
Podívejme se teď na následující obrázek, který detailně ukazuje, jak hyperscaleři v čase přispívají k růstu zisků na celém americkém akciovém trhu. V prvním čtvrtletí minulého roku to bylo více než třetinou, polovodiče asi 16 % a zbytek trhu asi 48 %. Trend je pak celkem jasný v tom smyslu, že hyperscaleři přispívají méně, zbytek trhu zhruba stejně a polovodiče vyznačené modře stále více:
Těžiště tahounů růstu zisků se tedy přesouvá od těch, kteří do AI investují, k těm, od nichž své investice nakupují. Je to celkem známý příběh točící se ve svém jádru kolem budoucí návratnosti AI investic. Tedy návratnosti toho, co hypercaleři nakupují a budují. Vývoj bývá skeptiky přirovnáván třeba k boomu železnic, kdy byla budována celá řada tratí. Jejichž využití nakonec v celku nebylo takové, jaké si budovatelé představovali. Nicméně třeba ocelárny, dodavatelé kolejí, nebo dřevěných pražců, mohly být spokojeni. Protože jejich zisky se dostavily.
Nevím, zda celý příběh kolem AI a s ní souvisejícími investicemi skončí podobně, jako ten s železnicemi. Nebo zda půjde cestou, kdy budoucí zisků hypercalerů dá prostor pro zajímavý růst cen bez toho, aby se valuace dostaly, či držely neudržitelně vysoko. V tom prvním „železnicovém“ případě by fakticky došlo k transferu bohatství od akcionářů hyperscalerů k akcionářům firem v polovodičích. Respektive všech těch, které dodávají hypercalerům. V tom druhém by všichni něco získali na celkové nově vytvořené hodnotě.
Tento pohled shora a z celku nám může ještě připomenout tezi ekonomů Goldman Sachs, podle které investice do AI nijak významně nepřispívají k růstu amerického produktu. Tento pohled jde proti naprosto dominantnímu, podle kterého jsou to naopak právě AI investice, co táhne celý produkt výrazně nahoru. V GS ale tvrdí, že investice hlavně natahují do USA dovozy. Nejde o žádný detail, k nějakému jasnému informačnímu rozuzlení tohoto příběhu ale nedochází. Ve scénáři GS by přitom případný útlum investic hypercalerů (daný přehodnocením potenciálu monetizovat AI) neměl mít větší dopad na HDP. Měl by dopad na dovozy. V druhém případě by platil opak – produkt by citlivě reagovat na změnu investičního chování hypercalerů.
Carmel Capital Partners LLC grew its stake in shares of Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) by 287.6% in the first quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 17,583 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock after acquiring an additional 13,047 shares during the quarter. Amazon.com comprises about 1.3% of Carmel Capital Partners LLC’s holdings, making the stock its 17th largest position. Carmel Capital Partners LLC’s holdings in Amazon.com were worth $3,662,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
Several other large investors have also modified their holdings of the stock. MilWealth Group LLC raised its stake in Amazon.com by 79.0% during the fourth quarter. MilWealth Group LLC now owns 179 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $41,000 after purchasing an additional 79 shares during the period. Lifetime Wealth Management P.C. acquired a new stake in shares of Amazon.com during the 4th quarter worth $45,000. Elkhorn Partners Limited Partnership increased its holdings in shares of Amazon.com by 900.0% during the 4th quarter. Elkhorn Partners Limited Partnership now owns 200 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $46,000 after buying an additional 180 shares during the last quarter. Fairway Wealth LLC raised its position in shares of Amazon.com by 95.6% in the 4th quarter. Fairway Wealth LLC now owns 221 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $51,000 after buying an additional 108 shares during the period. Finally, Prudent Man Investment Management Inc. raised its position in shares of Amazon.com by 87.7% in the 4th quarter. Prudent Man Investment Management Inc. now owns 229 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $53,000 after buying an additional 107 shares during the period. 72.20% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.
Wall Street Analyst Weigh In AMZN has been the subject of a number of research reports. Royal Bank Of Canada reissued a “buy” rating on shares of Amazon.com in a research report on Tuesday, June 16th. BNP Paribas Exane lifted their price objective on Amazon.com from $320.00 to $345.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, May 5th. Sanford C. Bernstein reiterated an “outperform” rating and set a $315.00 target price (up from $300.00) on shares of Amazon.com in a report on Thursday, April 30th. Stifel Nicolaus set a $319.00 target price on shares of Amazon.com and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, April 30th. Finally, Canaccord Genuity Group raised their price target on shares of Amazon.com from $300.00 to $330.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, April 30th. Fifty-seven investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have issued a Hold rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $312.91.
Get Our Latest Stock Report on AMZN
Amazon.com Trading Down 1.1% NASDAQ AMZN opened at $244.85 on Thursday. The stock has a market cap of $2.63 trillion, a P/E ratio of 29.29, a PEG ratio of 1.84 and a beta of 1.46. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $249.58 and its 200-day simple moving average is $236.30. The company has a current ratio of 1.18, a quick ratio of 1.01 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27. Amazon.com, Inc. has a 52 week low of $196.00 and a 52 week high of $278.56.
Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN – Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, April 29th. The e-commerce giant reported $2.78 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.63 by $1.15. Amazon.com had a net margin of 12.22% and a return on equity of 19.92%. The firm had revenue of $181.52 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $177.28 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $1.59 EPS. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 16.6% on a year-over-year basis. Equities research analysts predict that Amazon.com, Inc. will post 7.75 EPS for the current fiscal year.
Insider Activity at Amazon.com In other news, CEO Andrew R. Jassy sold 20,000 shares of Amazon.com stock in a transaction dated Thursday, May 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $263.42, for a total transaction of $5,268,400.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer directly owned 2,205,766 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $581,042,879.72. The trade was a 0.90% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, CEO Matthew S. Garman sold 15,467 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Thursday, May 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $263.40, for a total value of $4,074,007.80. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 14,159 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,729,480.60. This represents a 52.21% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Over the last ninety days, insiders sold 144,274 shares of company stock valued at $38,716,204. 8.90% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.
Trending Headlines about Amazon.com Here are the key news stories impacting Amazon.com this week:
Positive Sentiment: Analysts remain upbeat on Amazon’s core growth drivers, especially AWS, with Bank of America reiterating a Buy rating and saying cloud growth could exceed expectations on strong enterprise AI demand. Article Title Positive Sentiment: Wall Street is also leaning into a strong second quarter for Amazon, with forecasts calling for revenue and operating profit above consensus and expectations that AWS growth is accelerating. Article Title Positive Sentiment: Amazon Business crossed a $60 billion annualized sales run rate, reinforcing that the company’s higher-margin B2B and enterprise offerings are still expanding. Article Title Positive Sentiment: Several market-commentary pieces highlighted Amazon as a beneficiary of AI infrastructure spending and a potential earnings beat, which is helping support longer-term sentiment. Article Title Neutral Sentiment: Amazon confirmed layoffs in its artificial general intelligence group as it shifts resources toward customer-facing AI products. The move may improve focus and discipline, but it also underscores ongoing restructuring inside the company’s AI efforts. Article Title Neutral Sentiment: Amazon also announced a $400 million plan to rebuild two Florida warehouses, which supports logistics capacity but adds to the company’s already heavy capital-spending burden. Article Title Neutral Sentiment: AWS struck additional collaboration deals, including with Observe.AI and funding support for Myseum.AI, reinforcing Amazon Web Services’ role as a key AI platform partner. Article Title Negative Sentiment: Job cuts in the AGI unit and broader questions about the cost of Amazon’s AI buildout are weighing on sentiment, especially with investors already focused on the company’s massive 2026 capex plans. Article Title Negative Sentiment: Shares also appear pressured by a broader rotation out of mega-cap tech and renewed scrutiny on whether heavy AI spending will translate into returns quickly enough. Article Title Amazon.com Company Profile (Free Report)
Amazon.com, Inc is a diversified technology and retail company best known for its e-commerce marketplace and broad portfolio of consumer and enterprise services. Founded by Jeff Bezos in 1994 and headquartered in Seattle, Washington, the company launched as an online bookseller and expanded into a global retail platform that sells products directly to consumers and provides a marketplace for third-party sellers. Over time Amazon has grown beyond retail into areas including cloud computing, digital media, devices and logistics.
Key businesses and offerings include Amazon’s online marketplace and fulfillment services, the Amazon Prime membership program (which bundles expedited shipping with streaming and other benefits), Amazon Web Services (AWS) which supplies on-demand cloud computing and storage to businesses and public-sector customers, and a range of content and advertising services such as Prime Video and Amazon Advertising.
Featured Articles Five stocks we like better than Amazon.com Could Truth API Become Trump Media’s First Meaningful Revenue Driver? Small Caps Are Crushing the S&P 500—3 Stocks Still Worth Buying Moog Is More Than a Missile Maker, and Wall Street Is Noticing A Boring Dividend Growth Strategy Becomes a Solid Defensive Play Want to see what other hedge funds are holding AMZN? Visit HoldingsChannel.com to get the latest 13F filings and insider trades for Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN – Free Report).
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Candriam S.C.A. increased its position in Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) by 1.2% in the first quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 2,535,587 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock after purchasing an additional 30,379 shares during the period. Amazon.com accounts for about 2.7% of Candriam S.C.A.’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 5th biggest holding. Candriam S.C.A.’s holdings in Amazon.com were worth $528,087,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.
A number of other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in AMZN. Osprey Private Wealth LLC boosted its holdings in Amazon.com by 167.8% in the first quarter. Osprey Private Wealth LLC now owns 31,443 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $6,549,000 after purchasing an additional 19,703 shares during the period. Avid Wealth Partners LLC raised its stake in Amazon.com by 9.4% during the first quarter. Avid Wealth Partners LLC now owns 4,974 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $1,036,000 after acquiring an additional 428 shares during the period. Barnett & Company Inc. bought a new position in Amazon.com in the first quarter worth about $331,000. Petix & Botte Co lifted its holdings in Amazon.com by 4.9% in the first quarter. Petix & Botte Co now owns 2,896 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $603,000 after acquiring an additional 136 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Independence Bank of Kentucky raised its position in shares of Amazon.com by 4.5% during the 1st quarter. Independence Bank of Kentucky now owns 92,980 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $19,365,000 after purchasing an additional 3,979 shares during the period. 72.20% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.
Amazon.com News Roundup Here are the key news stories impacting Amazon.com this week:
Positive Sentiment: Analysts remain upbeat on Amazon’s core growth drivers, especially AWS, with Bank of America reiterating a Buy rating and saying cloud growth could exceed expectations on strong enterprise AI demand. Article Title Positive Sentiment: Wall Street is also leaning into a strong second quarter for Amazon, with forecasts calling for revenue and operating profit above consensus and expectations that AWS growth is accelerating. Article Title Positive Sentiment: Amazon Business crossed a $60 billion annualized sales run rate, reinforcing that the company’s higher-margin B2B and enterprise offerings are still expanding. Article Title Positive Sentiment: Several market-commentary pieces highlighted Amazon as a beneficiary of AI infrastructure spending and a potential earnings beat, which is helping support longer-term sentiment. Article Title Neutral Sentiment: Amazon confirmed layoffs in its artificial general intelligence group as it shifts resources toward customer-facing AI products. The move may improve focus and discipline, but it also underscores ongoing restructuring inside the company’s AI efforts. Article Title Neutral Sentiment: Amazon also announced a $400 million plan to rebuild two Florida warehouses, which supports logistics capacity but adds to the company’s already heavy capital-spending burden. Article Title Neutral Sentiment: AWS struck additional collaboration deals, including with Observe.AI and funding support for Myseum.AI, reinforcing Amazon Web Services’ role as a key AI platform partner. Article Title Negative Sentiment: Job cuts in the AGI unit and broader questions about the cost of Amazon’s AI buildout are weighing on sentiment, especially with investors already focused on the company’s massive 2026 capex plans. Article Title Negative Sentiment: Shares also appear pressured by a broader rotation out of mega-cap tech and renewed scrutiny on whether heavy AI spending will translate into returns quickly enough. Article Title Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth AMZN has been the subject of a number of recent research reports. Bank of America upped their price objective on Amazon.com from $298.00 to $310.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 30th. Susquehanna reaffirmed a “positive” rating and issued a $325.00 price objective (up from $300.00) on shares of Amazon.com in a report on Thursday, April 30th. Jefferies Financial Group reiterated a “buy” rating on shares of Amazon.com in a research report on Thursday, June 18th. Evercore lifted their price target on Amazon.com from $285.00 to $315.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, April 30th. Finally, TD Cowen reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $340.00 target price (down from $350.00) on shares of Amazon.com in a research note on Wednesday, July 8th. Fifty-seven equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have issued a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $312.91.
View Our Latest Analysis on AMZN
Insiders Place Their Bets In related news, SVP David Zapolsky sold 9,270 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Friday, May 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $268.53, for a total transaction of $2,489,273.10. Following the transaction, the senior vice president directly owned 41,190 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $11,060,750.70. The trade was a 18.37% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, CEO Matthew S. Garman sold 15,467 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Thursday, May 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $263.40, for a total value of $4,074,007.80. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer directly owned 14,159 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,729,480.60. This represents a 52.21% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders sold a total of 144,274 shares of company stock valued at $38,716,204 over the last 90 days. 8.90% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.
Amazon.com Stock Performance AMZN opened at $244.85 on Thursday. The company has a quick ratio of 1.01, a current ratio of 1.18 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27. The firm has a market cap of $2.63 trillion, a PE ratio of 29.29, a P/E/G ratio of 1.84 and a beta of 1.46. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $249.58 and a 200-day simple moving average of $236.30. Amazon.com, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $196.00 and a fifty-two week high of $278.56.
Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN – Get Free Report) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, April 29th. The e-commerce giant reported $2.78 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.63 by $1.15. Amazon.com had a return on equity of 19.92% and a net margin of 12.22%.The business had revenue of $181.52 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $177.28 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $1.59 earnings per share. Amazon.com’s revenue was up 16.6% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities analysts predict that Amazon.com, Inc. will post 7.75 EPS for the current fiscal year.
Amazon.com Profile (Free Report)
Amazon.com, Inc is a diversified technology and retail company best known for its e-commerce marketplace and broad portfolio of consumer and enterprise services. Founded by Jeff Bezos in 1994 and headquartered in Seattle, Washington, the company launched as an online bookseller and expanded into a global retail platform that sells products directly to consumers and provides a marketplace for third-party sellers. Over time Amazon has grown beyond retail into areas including cloud computing, digital media, devices and logistics.
Key businesses and offerings include Amazon’s online marketplace and fulfillment services, the Amazon Prime membership program (which bundles expedited shipping with streaming and other benefits), Amazon Web Services (AWS) which supplies on-demand cloud computing and storage to businesses and public-sector customers, and a range of content and advertising services such as Prime Video and Amazon Advertising.
Featured Stories Five stocks we like better than Amazon.com Could Truth API Become Trump Media’s First Meaningful Revenue Driver? Small Caps Are Crushing the S&P 500—3 Stocks Still Worth Buying Moog Is More Than a Missile Maker, and Wall Street Is Noticing A Boring Dividend Growth Strategy Becomes a Solid Defensive Play Want to see what other hedge funds are holding AMZN? Visit HoldingsChannel.com to get the latest 13F filings and insider trades for Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN – Free Report).
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Conning Inc. reduced its stake in Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) by 13.9% in the 1st quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 44,072 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock after selling 7,087 shares during the period. Conning Inc.’s holdings in Amazon.com were worth $9,179,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
A number of other hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. MilWealth Group LLC increased its stake in Amazon.com by 79.0% in the fourth quarter. MilWealth Group LLC now owns 179 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock valued at $41,000 after acquiring an additional 79 shares during the last quarter. Lifetime Wealth Management P.C. bought a new stake in Amazon.com during the fourth quarter worth $45,000. Elkhorn Partners Limited Partnership lifted its stake in Amazon.com by 900.0% during the fourth quarter. Elkhorn Partners Limited Partnership now owns 200 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $46,000 after purchasing an additional 180 shares during the last quarter. Fairway Wealth LLC raised its holdings in shares of Amazon.com by 95.6% during the 4th quarter. Fairway Wealth LLC now owns 221 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $51,000 after buying an additional 108 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Prudent Man Investment Management Inc. lifted its position in shares of Amazon.com by 87.7% during the 4th quarter. Prudent Man Investment Management Inc. now owns 229 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $53,000 after buying an additional 107 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 72.20% of the company’s stock.
Wall Street Analyst Weigh In A number of research analysts have recently commented on the stock. Phillip Securities raised shares of Amazon.com from a “moderate buy” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $280.00 target price for the company in a report on Wednesday, May 13th. Barclays reaffirmed an “overweight” rating on shares of Amazon.com in a research note on Tuesday, June 9th. Monness Crespi & Hardt upped their target price on Amazon.com from $280.00 to $315.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, April 30th. Evercore increased their target price on Amazon.com from $285.00 to $315.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, April 30th. Finally, TD Cowen reaffirmed a “buy” rating and issued a $340.00 price objective (down from $350.00) on shares of Amazon.com in a research note on Wednesday, July 8th. Fifty-seven research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have given a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $312.91.
View Our Latest Report on AMZN
Insider Buying and Selling In related news, CEO Matthew S. Garman sold 15,467 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, May 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $263.40, for a total transaction of $4,074,007.80. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 14,159 shares in the company, valued at $3,729,480.60. The trade was a 52.21% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, SVP David Zapolsky sold 9,270 shares of Amazon.com stock in a transaction on Friday, May 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $268.53, for a total transaction of $2,489,273.10. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president directly owned 41,190 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $11,060,750.70. This trade represents a 18.37% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders have sold a total of 144,274 shares of company stock worth $38,716,204 over the last ninety days. 8.90% of the stock is owned by company insiders.
Amazon.com News Summary Here are the key news stories impacting Amazon.com this week:
Positive Sentiment: Analysts remain upbeat on Amazon’s core growth drivers, especially AWS, with Bank of America reiterating a Buy rating and saying cloud growth could exceed expectations on strong enterprise AI demand. Article Title Positive Sentiment: Wall Street is also leaning into a strong second quarter for Amazon, with forecasts calling for revenue and operating profit above consensus and expectations that AWS growth is accelerating. Article Title Positive Sentiment: Amazon Business crossed a $60 billion annualized sales run rate, reinforcing that the company’s higher-margin B2B and enterprise offerings are still expanding. Article Title Positive Sentiment: Several market-commentary pieces highlighted Amazon as a beneficiary of AI infrastructure spending and a potential earnings beat, which is helping support longer-term sentiment. Article Title Neutral Sentiment: Amazon confirmed layoffs in its artificial general intelligence group as it shifts resources toward customer-facing AI products. The move may improve focus and discipline, but it also underscores ongoing restructuring inside the company’s AI efforts. Article Title Neutral Sentiment: Amazon also announced a $400 million plan to rebuild two Florida warehouses, which supports logistics capacity but adds to the company’s already heavy capital-spending burden. Article Title Neutral Sentiment: AWS struck additional collaboration deals, including with Observe.AI and funding support for Myseum.AI, reinforcing Amazon Web Services’ role as a key AI platform partner. Article Title Negative Sentiment: Job cuts in the AGI unit and broader questions about the cost of Amazon’s AI buildout are weighing on sentiment, especially with investors already focused on the company’s massive 2026 capex plans. Article Title Negative Sentiment: Shares also appear pressured by a broader rotation out of mega-cap tech and renewed scrutiny on whether heavy AI spending will translate into returns quickly enough. Article Title Amazon.com Stock Down 1.1% Shares of Amazon.com stock opened at $244.85 on Thursday. The stock’s 50-day moving average is $249.58 and its 200 day moving average is $236.30. Amazon.com, Inc. has a one year low of $196.00 and a one year high of $278.56. The firm has a market cap of $2.63 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.29, a PEG ratio of 1.84 and a beta of 1.46. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27, a current ratio of 1.18 and a quick ratio of 1.01.
Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN – Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, April 29th. The e-commerce giant reported $2.78 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.63 by $1.15. The firm had revenue of $181.52 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $177.28 billion. Amazon.com had a return on equity of 19.92% and a net margin of 12.22%.The company’s revenue was up 16.6% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $1.59 earnings per share. Equities research analysts anticipate that Amazon.com, Inc. will post 7.75 EPS for the current year.
About Amazon.com (Free Report)
Amazon.com, Inc is a diversified technology and retail company best known for its e-commerce marketplace and broad portfolio of consumer and enterprise services. Founded by Jeff Bezos in 1994 and headquartered in Seattle, Washington, the company launched as an online bookseller and expanded into a global retail platform that sells products directly to consumers and provides a marketplace for third-party sellers. Over time Amazon has grown beyond retail into areas including cloud computing, digital media, devices and logistics.
Key businesses and offerings include Amazon’s online marketplace and fulfillment services, the Amazon Prime membership program (which bundles expedited shipping with streaming and other benefits), Amazon Web Services (AWS) which supplies on-demand cloud computing and storage to businesses and public-sector customers, and a range of content and advertising services such as Prime Video and Amazon Advertising.
Read More Five stocks we like better than Amazon.com Could Truth API Become Trump Media’s First Meaningful Revenue Driver? Small Caps Are Crushing the S&P 500—3 Stocks Still Worth Buying Moog Is More Than a Missile Maker, and Wall Street Is Noticing A Boring Dividend Growth Strategy Becomes a Solid Defensive Play Want to see what other hedge funds are holding AMZN? Visit HoldingsChannel.com to get the latest 13F filings and insider trades for Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN – Free Report).
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« PREVIOUS HEADLINECandriam S.C.A. Buys 30,379 Shares of Amazon.com, Inc. $AMZN
As Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) sees a notable growth rate in Amazon Web Services (AWS) sales, Justin Post, an analyst at Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC), has reiterated a bullish position.
Post maintained a Buy rating on AMZN stock in a note to clients analyzed by Finbold on July 23. He also reaffirmed the bank’s 12-month price target for Amazon at $310, thereby implying a 26.6% upside.
“The analyst reiterates a Buy rating and $310 PT, expressing confidence in Amazon’s Q2 performance, particularly the re-acceleration of AWS growth,” the note reads.
BofA raised its second-quarter revenue estimate for Amazon to $198.8 billion and earnings before interest and taxes to $24.1 billion, both above Wall Street’s consensus. The firm also lifted its AWS sales growth forecast to 33 percent year-over-year, a 5 percentage point acceleration from the first quarter.
Post said AMZN stock’s bullish outlook is bolstered by robust demand for Anthropic-related revenues and OpenAI models powering Amazon Bedrock. Additionally, the analyst expects AWS operating margins to expand to 34% on a year-over-year basis, supported by strong capacity utilization and improved pricing power.
Nonetheless, the bank pointed to key headwinds likely to impact AMZN stock. He said the company may increase its 2026 capital expenditure outlook to as high as $210 billion due to rising memory costs. Meanwhile, Post expects AWS margins may contract sequentially in the second quarter as stock-based compensation expenses rise.
Is AMZN a good stock to buy? Ahead of the July 30 Amazon earnings call for the second quarter of 2026, Post noted that cloud sector results from the company’s major peers are expected to heavily influence investor expectations. Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOGL) reported on July 22, while Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) is scheduled to follow on July 29.
AMZN analyst ratings. Source: TipRanks Following Post’s bullish sentiment for AMZN stock, 46 analysts surveyed by TipRanks have issued an average Strong Buy rating for the company. These analysts have set an average 12-month price target for Amazon stock at $318.98, suggesting a potential 30.27% upside.
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Happy Thursday. If our minds weren't already racing thanks to wildfire smoke and the cyclospora outbreak, we may also need to worry about rouge artificial intelligence agents.
Stock futures are falling this morning after a down day for Wall Street.
Here are five key things investors need to know to start the trading day:
1. ABCsShares of Alphabet and Tesla are lower before the bell after the companies reported quarterly results on one of the sector's first key earnings days this season. Despite revenue beats for both technology giants, Wall Street appeared more focused on — and concerned by — their artificial intelligence spending.
Here's what to know:
Alphabet said its cloud revenue jumped 82%, but the Google parent's plan to lift capital expenditures again put downward pressure on shares. The stock is down 5% before the bell.Tesla significantly missed Wall Street's earnings per share estimates for the second quarter. The company's shares dropped more than 7% in extended trading.Shares of IBM, which cratered last week following an earnings warning, are also lower this morning after weaker-than-expected results for the quarter. IBM CEO Arvind Krishna's will join CNBC's "Squawk on the Street" at 10 a.m. ET. Watch live here.Stock futures are pulling back this morning as investors parse through the latest reports. Follow live markets updates here.2. Weight of warOil prices are up nearly 5% this morning following reported attacks on tankers off the coast of Saudi Arabia. The gains put U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude futures back above the $90 per barrel mark, their highest level in more than a month.
As CNBC's Matt Peterson writes, rising gasoline and diesel prices are set to weigh on Americans' standard of living this summer. The U.S. Energy Information Administration's diesel benchmark posted its biggest weekly jump since early March last week — a particularly concerning sign, since diesel price can affect prices across the economy.
3. Schoolhouse rockThe House of Representatives passed legislation yesterday that would block members of Congress from purchasing individual stocks while in office. The bill, named the Stop Insider Trading Act, now heads to the Senate.
As CNBC's Justin Papp notes, there is widespread public support for a ban on congressional stock trading. But while more than a dozen Democrats voted in support of the GOP-led bill, others in the party said the legislation doesn't go for enough to stop all stock trading.
Meanwhile, the Senate is considering an updated bill that would bar presidents and other federal officials from sponsoring cryptocurrency and other digital assets. President Donald Trump has signed off on the ethics section of the bill, according to Sen. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio.
4. Tale of two timelinesEuropean Union antitrust regulators gave the green light to the proposed Paramount-Warner Bros. Discovery merger yesterday. The approval comes as the deal faces delays in the U.S. thanks to a lawsuit from a group of state attorneys general.
The European Commission said Paramount, in order to receive its approval, agreed to divest its stake in a film distribution joint venture in Europe with United International Pictures. The entertainment giant also said it wouldn't enter into a distribution deal with Universal in the continent over the next 10 years.
In other media news, Comcast beat estimates this morning and said that NBCUniversal's streaming service, Peacock, reached profitability for the first time. The company is preparing to spin off its media businesses.
5. More cutsAmazon is laying off more workers, this time in its generative artificial intelligence unit.
The ecommerce giant declined to say how many staffers or what parts of its AGI business were affected. An Amazon spokesperson told CNBC that "we're sharpening our focus on the initiatives that matter most for customers, so we can move faster on what counts."
As CNBC's Annie Palmer notes, the Washington-based company has downsized in recent years after a hiring surge during the pandemic. The headcount cuts also come as Amazon spends big on building out AI infrastructure.
The Daily DividendCNBC's Steve Liesman analyzed Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh's most-used phrases across five recent public appearances. Here are the three that kept coming up, and how many times the Warsh used them:
"Family fight": 13"First principles": 11"Inflation is a choice": 6— CNBC's Samantha Subin, MacKenzie Sigalos, Jordan Novet, Jonathan Vanian, Lora Kolodny, Tanaya Macheel, Matt Peterson, Pippa Stevens, Spencer Kimball, Emily Wilkins, Lillian Rizzo, Annie Palmer and Steve Liesman contributed to this report.
Luke Fountain assisted in the production of this newsletter. Josephine Rozzelle edited this edition.
DENVER--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- #AmazonCareerChoice--Guild partners with Amazon's Career Choice program, giving eligible employees a pathway to high-demand maintenance and engineering technician roles.
Amazon (AMZN) shares are seeing more pressure Thursday after Alphabet (GOOGL) and Tesla (TSLA) signaled a CapEx increase in earnings. @CharlesSchwab's Ben Watson shows the short and long-term price action in the stock to highlight key support and resistance areas investors need to watch.
India's government on Thursday eased foreign investment rules to allow e-commerce companies to buy products directly from Indian sellers and then sell them to overseas customers, a major win for Amazon which lobbied for the change for months.
Amazon.com stock is trending lower. What’s pulling AMZN shares down? Earnings Preview & HistoryAmazon is scheduled to report second-quarter earnings on July 30. Analysts estimate EPS of $1.82 along with revenue of $196.02 billion. For the prior quarter, Amazon reported EPS of $2.78, beating the consensus estimate of $1.64. The company also posted revenue of $181.52 billion, exceeding the consensus estimate of $177.29 billion.
Over the last four quarters, Amazon has averaged an EPS surprise of 0.30% and a revenue surprise of 0.02%.
What To WatchInvestors will be watching AWS revenue growth and operating margin closely, since that’s the clearest signal of whether enterprise AI demand is actually boosting cloud profitability rather than just driving up capex and depreciation. Advertising revenue growth is another key figure to track, as it can help offset retail margin pressure and keep overall operating income moving in the right direction.
In North America and International retail, the focus shifts to operating income and fulfillment cost trends — if shipping and logistics costs start climbing again, they could quickly eat into any gains from stronger sales.
Analyst Consensus & Recent Actions The stock carries a Buy rating with an average price forecast of $320.10. Recent analyst moves include:
Wells Fargo: Overweight (Raises Target to $322.00) (July 21) Keybanc: Overweight (Raises Target to $335.00) (July 16) Wedbush: Outperform (Target $293.00) (July 16) A Tug-of-War Above the 200-Day AverageFrom a trend perspective, Amazon is in a "tug-of-war" zone: it’s trading 2.1% below the 20-day SMA ($243.61) and 4.8% below the 50-day SMA ($250.60), but it’s still 1.7% above the 200-day SMA ($234.46). That mix often reads as a pullback inside a longer uptrend, with the 200-day acting as the line bulls want to defend.
Momentum is also fairly balanced, with RSI at 47.59 (neutral), suggesting the stock isn’t stretched enough to force either capitulation selling or a snapback rally on momentum alone. In practice, that puts more weight on nearby levels and moving averages—especially whether price can reclaim the 20-day/50-day area on rebounds.
The moving-average structure is mixed: the 20-day SMA is below the 50-day SMA (a bearish near-term crossover), while the 50-day SMA remains above the 200-day SMA after the golden cross in May. Traders will often treat that as "long-term trend intact, short-term trend under pressure," which fits with the recent swing high in May followed by a swing low in June.
Key levels are fairly clean here, with overhead supply near the mid-$240s to around $250 and a more meaningful downside reference well below current price. A break and hold back above the 50-day area would improve the near-term picture, while losing the 200-day would raise the odds that the pullback is turning into something deeper.
Key Resistance: $249.50 — lines up closely with the 50-day SMA area ($250.60), a common spot where rebounds can stall Key Support: $225.00 — a nearby downside level traders may watch as a prior demand zone if the pullback accelerates Benzinga Edge RankingsBelow is the Benzinga Edge scorecard for Amazon, highlighting its strengths and weaknesses compared to the broader market:
The Verdict: Amazon’s Benzinga Edge signal reveals a growth-heavy profile with only moderate momentum, which fits a stock that can trend long-term but still chop around key moving averages in the short run. For traders, that often means waiting for either a reclaim of the $249.50 area or a cleaner dip toward support before pressing directional bets.
Amazon Shares Edge LowerAMZN Price Action: At the time of publication, Amazon shares are trading 3.11% lower at $237.24, according to data from Benzinga Pro.
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This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors.
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AlpenGlobal Capital LLC purchased a new position in Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN – Free Report) during the first quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm purchased 52,934 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock, valued at approximately $11,024,000. Amazon.com comprises about 7.2% of AlpenGlobal Capital LLC’s portfolio, making the stock its 4th largest position.
A number of other hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of AMZN. Red Crane Wealth Management LLC grew its position in shares of Amazon.com by 2.3% in the 1st quarter. Red Crane Wealth Management LLC now owns 1,663 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $346,000 after buying an additional 38 shares during the last quarter. Robinson Smith Wealth Advisors LLC increased its position in Amazon.com by 0.7% during the 1st quarter. Robinson Smith Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 5,509 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock valued at $1,147,000 after purchasing an additional 40 shares during the period. Lifelong Wealth Advisors Inc. increased its position in Amazon.com by 2.4% during the 4th quarter. Lifelong Wealth Advisors Inc. now owns 1,740 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock valued at $402,000 after purchasing an additional 41 shares during the period. Financial Connections Group Inc. raised its holdings in Amazon.com by 2.6% in the 4th quarter. Financial Connections Group Inc. now owns 1,633 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $376,000 after purchasing an additional 42 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Marquette Asset Management LLC raised its holdings in Amazon.com by 5.1% in the 4th quarter. Marquette Asset Management LLC now owns 886 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $205,000 after purchasing an additional 43 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 72.20% of the company’s stock.
Analysts Set New Price Targets A number of brokerages have recently weighed in on AMZN. Telsey Advisory Group lifted their target price on shares of Amazon.com from $300.00 to $315.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 30th. Evercore increased their price target on shares of Amazon.com from $285.00 to $315.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 30th. TD Securities upgraded shares of Amazon.com to a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, April 13th. Moffett Nathanson lifted their price objective on Amazon.com from $283.00 to $288.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, April 7th. Finally, Needham & Company LLC upped their target price on Amazon.com from $265.00 to $300.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, April 30th. Fifty-seven research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have given a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $312.91.
Read Our Latest Stock Analysis on AMZN
Amazon.com Stock Performance Shares of AMZN opened at $244.85 on Thursday. The company has a quick ratio of 1.01, a current ratio of 1.18 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27. The stock has a market cap of $2.63 trillion, a P/E ratio of 29.29, a P/E/G ratio of 1.84 and a beta of 1.46. The business’s 50 day moving average price is $249.58 and its 200-day moving average price is $236.30. Amazon.com, Inc. has a 52 week low of $196.00 and a 52 week high of $278.56.
Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN – Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, April 29th. The e-commerce giant reported $2.78 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.63 by $1.15. Amazon.com had a return on equity of 19.92% and a net margin of 12.22%.The company had revenue of $181.52 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $177.28 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $1.59 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 16.6% on a year-over-year basis. Equities research analysts anticipate that Amazon.com, Inc. will post 7.75 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.
Trending Headlines about Amazon.com Here are the key news stories impacting Amazon.com this week:
Positive Sentiment: Analysts remain upbeat on Amazon’s core growth drivers, especially AWS, with Bank of America reiterating a Buy rating and saying cloud growth could exceed expectations on strong enterprise AI demand. Article Title Positive Sentiment: Wall Street is also leaning into a strong second quarter for Amazon, with forecasts calling for revenue and operating profit above consensus and expectations that AWS growth is accelerating. Article Title Positive Sentiment: Amazon Business crossed a $60 billion annualized sales run rate, reinforcing that the company’s higher-margin B2B and enterprise offerings are still expanding. Article Title Positive Sentiment: Several market-commentary pieces highlighted Amazon as a beneficiary of AI infrastructure spending and a potential earnings beat, which is helping support longer-term sentiment. Article Title Neutral Sentiment: Amazon confirmed layoffs in its artificial general intelligence group as it shifts resources toward customer-facing AI products. The move may improve focus and discipline, but it also underscores ongoing restructuring inside the company’s AI efforts. Article Title Neutral Sentiment: Amazon also announced a $400 million plan to rebuild two Florida warehouses, which supports logistics capacity but adds to the company’s already heavy capital-spending burden. Article Title Neutral Sentiment: AWS struck additional collaboration deals, including with Observe.AI and funding support for Myseum.AI, reinforcing Amazon Web Services’ role as a key AI platform partner. Article Title Negative Sentiment: Job cuts in the AGI unit and broader questions about the cost of Amazon’s AI buildout are weighing on sentiment, especially with investors already focused on the company’s massive 2026 capex plans. Article Title Negative Sentiment: Shares also appear pressured by a broader rotation out of mega-cap tech and renewed scrutiny on whether heavy AI spending will translate into returns quickly enough. Article Title Insider Activity In other news, Director Jonathan Rubinstein sold 3,849 shares of Amazon.com stock in a transaction dated Friday, April 24th. The stock was sold at an average price of $260.00, for a total value of $1,000,740.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director owned 78,654 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $20,450,040. The trade was a 4.67% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, CEO Andrew R. Jassy sold 31,352 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, May 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $275.00, for a total transaction of $8,621,800.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 2,175,766 shares in the company, valued at approximately $598,335,650. The trade was a 1.42% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Over the last three months, insiders sold 144,274 shares of company stock valued at $38,716,204. 8.90% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.
About Amazon.com (Free Report)
Amazon.com, Inc is a diversified technology and retail company best known for its e-commerce marketplace and broad portfolio of consumer and enterprise services. Founded by Jeff Bezos in 1994 and headquartered in Seattle, Washington, the company launched as an online bookseller and expanded into a global retail platform that sells products directly to consumers and provides a marketplace for third-party sellers. Over time Amazon has grown beyond retail into areas including cloud computing, digital media, devices and logistics.
Key businesses and offerings include Amazon’s online marketplace and fulfillment services, the Amazon Prime membership program (which bundles expedited shipping with streaming and other benefits), Amazon Web Services (AWS) which supplies on-demand cloud computing and storage to businesses and public-sector customers, and a range of content and advertising services such as Prime Video and Amazon Advertising.
Read More Five stocks we like better than Amazon.com Could Truth API Become Trump Media’s First Meaningful Revenue Driver? Small Caps Are Crushing the S&P 500—3 Stocks Still Worth Buying Moog Is More Than a Missile Maker, and Wall Street Is Noticing A Boring Dividend Growth Strategy Becomes a Solid Defensive Play
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SummaryCompaniesPrime Video to receive an AI-driven redesignJeff Bezos is overseeing Prime Video projectAmazon aims to improve its battered reputation in AISAN FRANCISCO, July 23 (Reuters) - Jeff Bezos has identified a new, high-profile platform to help showcase the hundreds of billions of dollars Amazon (AMZN.O), opens new tab has bet on artificial intelligence: Prime Video.
The Amazon founder and executive chairman pushed Prime Video head Mike Hopkins to overhaul the streaming service so that AI is front and center, according to four people with direct knowledge of the matter.
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The resulting project, known internally as Lighthouse, would shine a light on Amazon’s AI capabilities for the more than 200 million consumers who use Prime Video.
Lighthouse is viewed as one critical piece in Amazon’s companywide efforts to elevate the company’s stature in artificial intelligence, as competitors like OpenAI and Anthropic speed ahead, the people said. Other AI initiatives, such as the multiyear overhaul of its Alexa voice assistant to provide more conversational responses, have had mixed results and the unit is still losing money, people familiar with the matter have previously told Reuters.
Amazon declined to comment.
CONTENTIOUS MEETING SPARKED OVERHAULThe Prime Video initiative grew out of an internal presentation the streaming service’s executives made to Bezos last autumn that turned contentious, according to these people.
Bezos was displeased that Hopkins' plans to update Prime Video failed to sufficiently highlight the service’s capabilities in AI and personalization, according to the people. Bezos' response prompted the Prime Video executives to scrap their previous plans and embark on Lighthouse.
The company has committed some $200 billion to capital expenditures this year, related primarily to developing AI, and invested an initial $23 billion in ChatGPT-maker OpenAI and Anthropic combined, with the potential for upwards of another $40 billion.
Lighthouse entails a broad swath of new features that use AI to improve film and TV recommendations, in part by learning consumers' preferences, and responding to spoken requests, according to one person with knowledge of the project who spoke on condition of anonymity. Prime Video is working on redesigning the main home page as part of the project, the other people said.
The final redesign has not yet been settled, but one option Prime Video executives discussed includes AI-driven tiles, with pre-populated viewing suggestions like “action movies from the 1980s” or “Christmas rom-coms,” three of the people said. Another source said a current version does not include text-heavy tiles.
The traditional search function would remain, as well as space at the top of the screen for video highlights promoting new releases or sporting events, such as “Thursday Night Football,” the weekly National Football League game that is exclusive to Amazon.
Amazon is already testing versions of the redesign with a few users, said one of the people. Prime Video's plans, the people said, could change due to feedback from early testers, or financial or other concerns.
Prime Video, like other streaming services, relies on paid placement by studios, as well as software algorithms, to dictate where content is displayed on the home screen, said Michael Goodman, director of entertainment research for Parks Associates. Any change to that, including through greater personalization, could upend that system, he said.
“The real estate on the home screen is very valuable to studios, so it would be a big change to take away any of that coveted space,” said Goodman.
FOUNDER'S PERSONAL INVOLVEMENTBezos has been personally involved in the Prime Video overhaul, the people said, including receiving occasional updates, underscoring the stakes for a company battling a reputation for subpar AI foundation models. Improved personalization can lead to more hours spent on the service.
His involvement with the Prime Video project is unusual as he has taken a step back from most day-to-day operations at Amazon since relinquishing the CEO title in 2021. He also owns the Washington Post and is the founder of spaceflight firm Blue Origin and AI startup Prometheus, reportedly valued at around $41 billion. He has focused more of his attention on those projects.
Prime Video is one of Amazon's best-known brands and is available to consumers in a number of markets where Amazon has limited or no e-commerce presence. Beyond no-cost shipping, Prime Video is the Prime subscription's most-used offering.
As part of the Lighthouse project, Amazon has also discussed integrating the Alexa voice assistant into Prime Video’s search function, the people said. Amazon in early 2025 released an overhauled generative AI version of Alexa, and integrated it into its main shopping site in May 2026.
Kam Keshmiri, global head of the Prime Video design, was also at the meeting with Bezos and is now leading the Lighthouse redesign, the people said.
PRIME VIDEO'S MARKET POSITIONIn the U.S., Prime Video is the fourth most-watched streaming service, but it is prized by Bezos, who frequents high-profile Hollywood events and owns a $165 million home in Beverly Hills.
Amazon became the first streaming service to win an Academy Award in a major category. The company deepened its commitment to entertainment in 2022 when it paid $8.5 billion to buy MGM, giving it access to many well-known entertainment franchises, including James Bond.
Prime Video’s 4.2% share of television viewing in the U.S. trails YouTube with 13.4%, Netflix (NFLX.O), opens new tab at 7.8% and Walt Disney's (DIS.N), opens new tab Disney+ at 5%, according to April data from Nielsen. Still, many Prime Video members spend hours a week consuming content on the platform, and the company wants to further hone its personalization capabilities through AI.
The service released a significant redesign in July 2024, aimed at making it easier for users to distinguish between what content is free and what costs extra, such as subscriptions to Paramount+ and TV shows and movies that require a rental fee.
Amazon wants Prime Video to be users’ central hub for paid subscriptions.
Reporting by Greg Bensinger in San Francisco and Dawn Chmielewski in Los Angeles; Editing by Edmund Lee and Matthew Lewis
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab
Greg Bensinger joined Reuters as a technology correspondent in 2022 focusing on the world's largest technology companies. He was previously a member of The New York Times editorial board and a technology beat reporter for The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal. He also worked for Bloomberg News writing about the auto and telecommunications industries. He studied English literature at The University of Virginia and graduate journalism at Columbia University. Greg lives in San Francisco with his wife and two children.
A new Government Accountability Office report commissioned by Sen. Bernie Sanders finds the number of Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN | AMZN Price Prediction) workers relying on federal food and health assistance has nearly tripled since 2020, even as the company disclosed plans to spend $200 billion on artificial intelligence infrastructure in 2026.
The GAO reviewed enrollment data from 11 states representing roughly one-fifth of the U.S. population, covering February 2020 through September 2025. In those states, 12,346 Amazon workers were enrolled in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and 11,338 in Medicaid, figures the report says are nearly triple the counts in the prior GAO study.
Amazon ranked second among traditional employers of public-assistance recipients in the sample, behind Walmart, which had 16,055 workers on Medicaid, a 55% increase from the earlier report, and 15,515 on SNAP. Gig platforms including Uber, Lyft, DoorDash, Grubhub and Instacart collectively surpassed Walmart to become the single largest category of SNAP recipients, a reflection of how contract labor has reshaped the low-wage workforce.
A National Picture Nationally, the GAO estimates 13.8 million working Americans are on Medicaid, up from 12 million in 2020, and 10.6 million on SNAP, up from 9 million. Wage data helps explain the persistence. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports average hourly earnings for the total private sector reached $37.64 in June 2026, but real average hourly earnings have barely moved, sitting at $11.32 in June 2026 compared with $11.18 in June 2024. The BEA’s latest quarterly figures show transfer receipts have grown to $5,099.7 billion in the first quarter of 2026, with Medicaid outlays climbing to $1,060.2 billion.
The Corporate Side of the Ledger Over roughly the same window covered by the GAO study, Amazon’s annual profit grew from $11.59 billion to $77.67 billion. Revenue reached $716.92 billion in fiscal 2025, with operating income of $79.98 billion.
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On the Q4 2025 earnings call on Feb. 5, 2026, CEO Andy Jassy told investors the company would spend about $200 billion in capital expenditures in 2026, a roughly 60% increase from about $125 billion in 2025, saying the outlays are “predominantly in AWS” to meet AI compute demand. Jassy characterized the spend as demand-driven: “We are monetizing capacity as fast as we can install it.”
The most recent quarter offers evidence the AI bet is landing. AWS generated $37.59 billion in revenue in Q1 2026, up 28% year over year, the segment’s fastest growth in 15 quarters. Capital expenditures in that single quarter hit $44.2 billion, and free cash flow fell sharply as the buildout accelerated. Prediction market participants on Polymarket assign a 0.89 probability that Amazon’s 2026 capex will exceed $200 billion.
What to Watch The two datasets cover overlapping but nonidentical fiscal years, which limits any causal reading between the AI outlays and the growth in workers on public assistance. The GAO report establishes that the workforce dependency trend accelerated during years when Amazon’s earnings, and its capital ambitions, were expanding at their fastest pace in company history. The next signal comes on July 30, 2026, when Amazon reports Q2 results and updates its capex guidance for the balance of the year.
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There are numerous ways Amazon (AMZN -1.09%) stands to benefit from artificial intelligence (AI). Some of the more obvious efficiencies can be gained through robotics or more targeted advertising, both of which stand to improve the company's logistics and e-commerce operations.
In my eyes, the biggest opportunity for AI-driven growth touches the company's cloud infrastructure business, Amazon Web Services (AWS). Amazon CEO Andy Jassy has already hinted that the company's custom Trainium, Inferentia, and Graviton chips could be sold externally. Meanwhile, Jassy has made it clear that Amazon's data center build-outs are a core pillar supporting the company's broader AI roadmap.
One thing investors seem to overlook, however, is that AWS has also leaned into neocloud capacity deals to supplement its own infrastructure. With Amazon scheduled to report earnings on July 30, I think Jassy could announce a new neocloud agreement -- specifically with Nebius Group (NBIS +0.61%). Let's dig into why a deal between AWS and Nebius could make sense.
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy. Image source: Amazon.com.
What are neoclouds, and how does Amazon use them? Unlike traditional hyperscalers that juggle a multitude of general-purpose services, neoclouds focus almost exclusively on leasing high-performance GPU clusters. Companies such as CoreWeave and Nebius provide cloud-based capacity featuring accelerators from Nvidia to their end customers.
Nebius has already signed a deal worth up to $19 billion with Microsoft and another worth up to $27 billion with Meta Platforms. Back in November, AWS signed a 15-year lease agreement with Cipher Mining worth $5.5 billion. Cipher will deliver 300 megawatts of high-performance compute to AWS through a new data center campus in Texas.
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Why AWS and Nebius look like a good match A partnership between AWS and Nebius comes with a number of mutual benefits. For AWS, Nebius brings scalable GPU capacity backed by a deep relationship with Nvidia that includes priority access to next-generation chips. Moreover, Nebius' ecosystem can integrate with AWS services like Bedrock.
In addition, Amazon's new $25 billion bond deal is a clear signal that the company cannot use its own free cash flow to fund the entirety of its AI infrastructure vision. This makes collaborating with a neocloud to bridge capacity demand even more appealing.
For Nebius, a deal with AWS provides even more hyperscaler revenue visibility and further validation at the highest level. It also opens doors to AWS's vast enterprise customer base and ecosystem tools, helping accelerate adoption beyond its existing relationships.
Image source: The Motley Fool.
Nebius stock could soar on news of another hyperscaler deal The deals with Meta and Microsoft feature firm capacity reservations for thousands of GPUs over multiple years, proving Nebius can handle hyperscaler demand. Adding AWS to its ecosystem would diversify Nebius's customer base, reduce revenue concentration risk, and signal broader industry acceptance of neocloud platforms.
All told, the combination of AWS's market leadership and Nebius's specialized capacity creates a compelling opportunity in the AI infrastructure era. A deal between the two parties would serve as a powerful catalyst for Nebius stock as it highlights the ongoing shortage of AI compute -- positioning the stock for outsize gains as AI build-outs accelerate.
Adam Spatacco has positions in Amazon, Microsoft, and Nvidia. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Amazon, Meta Platforms, Microsoft, and Nvidia. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
Meta Platforms (META -2.53%) and Amazon (AMZN -1.09%) are two of my favorite short- and long-term buys. With the companies set to report earnings on July 29 and July 30, respectively, I'd be scooping up shares of both before then.
Both Meta and Amazon stocks have been laggards over the past year, but that doesn't mean the companies haven't been performing well. While they have been penalized for their aggressive AI infrastructure plans, that should be about to change.
Let's look at why both stocks look like great buys right now.
Image source: The Motely Fool.
Amazon: Accelerating cloud growth Amazon has a history of investing aggressively, and history tells us that the company generally comes out much stronger after these big investment cycles. Its investments today are centered largely around building AI infrastructure, and the company's efforts in this area should lead to continued accelerating revenue growth at its AWS cloud computing unit when it reports its second quarter results after the bell on July 30.
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Amazon invented the entire infrastructure-as-a-service cloud industry, and it continues to be the market share leader. Because of AWS' sheer size, though, its growth rate has lagged behind its peers. However, Q2 should demonstrate that not only is AWS' growth now much more robust, but that it is sustainable, backed by partnerships with Anthropic and OpenAI. The company also has a nice advantage in this area with its custom chip business, which should just continue to grow.
At the same time, Amazon's e-commerce business continues to hum along. The company's Amazon Prime Day event in June was once again strong, with Adobe and Retail Drive reporting that U.S. online sales jumped more than 9% during the event. And with the event shifting from Q3 to Q2, Amazon should see a nice lift in sales.
What is most exciting about Amazon's e-commerce business, though, is the operating leverage the company has been seeing with its investments in robotics and AI. Amazon is the world's leading manufacturer of robots, and with more than 1 million deployed in its fulfillment centers and coordinated by its Deepfleet AI model, it is driving serious efficiency gains in this business. That, in turn, is driving strong profitability growth that is nicely outpacing revenue growth.
Trading at a forward P/E of below 25 times 2027 analyst estimates, the stock is historically cheap and also a bargain compared to its brick-and-mortar peers, Costco and Walmart, which trade at forward P/Es above 37. That makes Amazon a bargain stock to buy ahead of earnings and to hold for the long term.
Meta Platforms: The newest cloud player After bungling its metaverse vision and wasting a boatload of cash in the process with little to show for it, investors have been rightfully cautious about Meta's AI ambitions. However, the company is starting to change the narrative, and it will have a great chance to continue to do this on its next earnings call after it reports its Q2 results after the bell on July 29.
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Meta revealed that it is looking to get in on the cloud computing game, with the social media giant in talks to lease up to $10 billion in computing capacity to Anthropic over the next two years. In total, Meta is looking to build approximately 14 gigawatts of AI capacity by 2027.
A cloud computing offering will give Meta more flexibility and ease the fear of it overbuilding capacity, since the company would be able to move between its own needs and those of customers. The company has also revealed its own custom chip, Iris, which it developed with Broadcom, to meet Meta's specific needs. The chip should also help Meta save costs. Meanwhile, its new AI model, Spark Muse 1.1, looks like a big leap forward.
At the same time, Meta's use of AI has been driving strong revenue growth, improving its recommendation algorithm to keep users on its sites longer, and helping advertisers achieve better conversion. This is leading to increased ad loads and higher prices. The company also has a huge runway as it starts to introduce ads to WhatsApp and Threads.
With Meta growing rapidly and trading at a forward P/E of only 17 times 2027 estimates, the stock has a lot of room to move higher in the short and long terms.
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An Alexa+ signage during an unveiling event in New York, US, on Wednesday, Feb. 26, 2025. Bloomberg/Getty Images Amazon has redesigned Alexa to rely less on Anthropic models, part of a sweeping effort to lower the cost of running its AI-powered voice assistant, according to internal documents reviewed by Business Insider.
The documents, which span late last year through early this year, show Amazon pursuing a series of changes in how Alexa generates answers by routing more requests to its in-house AI models, avoiding unnecessary calls to Anthropic's Claude models, and squeezing more work from each GPU.
Together, the initiatives were expected to more than quadruple the number of customer transactions each unit of computing capacity could support.
The effort offers a glimpse into AI's next battleground.
As frontier models become more capable, competition is shifting from building smarter AI to making them cheaper to run. Google has promoted lower-cost AI through Gemini Flash, while companies including OpenAI and Cursor have introduced techniques that automatically send simpler requests to lower-cost models.
Amazon's financial projections underscore why the company has devoted so much effort to this challenge.
Internal forecasts from early this year showed AWS cloud costs for the upgraded, AI-powered Alexa+ were on pace to reach roughly $1.7 billion in 2026, nearly triple the previous year.
Alexa+ was also projected to run about 60% above Amazon's target for AWS cloud cost per monthly active user. Even after identifying roughly $450 million in potential savings, internal reviews concluded the business would not hit its financial targets. Amazon declined to comment.
A costly new AlexaUnlike earlier versions of Alexa, Alexa+ generates many responses with large language models running on GPU-intensive cloud services. That turned relatively inexpensive voice requests into AI workloads that cost far more to serve.
Those costs became more important as Amazon worked through a difficult launch. Business Insider previously reported that the company delayed Alexa+ multiple times as engineers grappled with AI hallucinations and questions about whether the service was ready for customers. Alexa+ expanded its availability in the US earlier this year.
Scaling the service only increased the financial pressure, a sign of how different generative AI is from more traditional software services.
As Alexa+ rolled out to more users, Amazon projected sharply higher AWS cloud spending as demand for AI computing capacity grew.
The company even weighed delaying some of its most expensive AI initiatives. Business Insider previously reported that Project Moonraker, Amazon's effort to give Alexa more advanced AI agent capabilities, was expected to become the service's largest AI expense this year, and the company considered delaying parts of the project as it searched for savings.
Reducing unnecessary calls to Claude
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy Andrej Sokolow/picture alliance via Getty Images One of Amazon's priorities was narrowing where Anthropic's Claude models would be used inside Alexa+.
Internal roadmaps called for moving specialized Alexa "Experts" from Claude Sonnet to Amazon's own AI models while reducing other use of Claude across the digital-assistant service.
Amazon also sought to avoid inference whenever possible. Inference is how AI models are run, and one way to limit the cost of this is to use caching, which stores answers to common requests so the AI doesn't have to do the same work again.
One Amazon roadmap called for Alexa+ to stop calling Claude models when suitable answers were already available in cache, and expand "deterministic" handling, which enables Alexa to answer more predictable requests without tapping a large language model.
The strategy is notable given Amazon's deep ties to Anthropic. Amazon has invested billions in the AI startup, partners closely with it, and stands to reap a significant windfall from Anthropic's IPO, if that goes ahead.
Yet the official internal documents reviewed by Business Insider show Amazon has been looking for ways to reduce how often Alexa relies on Anthropic's models.
Amazon's approach mirrors a growing trend across the AI industry. Investment firm William Blair wrote in a recent report that software companies are starting to reserve frontier models for difficult, high-stakes reasoning while routing less complex requests to cheaper models. That lowers inference costs without changing the customer experience.
"Multi-model routing is becoming standard architecture in software," analysts at William Blair wrote in the report.
Delivering more with fewer GPUsReducing model costs was only one part of the strategy. Amazon also focused on increasing how much work each GPU could perform.
Rather than simply adding more Nvidia GPUs, Amazon wanted to process more customer requests from the same computing gear. One roadmap projected software upgrades would increase available computing capacity by roughly 50% while cutting response times by about 40%. Internal planning dashboards tracked projected customer growth, GPU utilization, available capacity and inference efficiency as Amazon prepared to scale Alexa+.
Amazon's cost-saving efforts extended beyond software. Planning documents show the company evaluating both Nvidia GPUs and its own Trainium chips to further lower the cost of running Alexa+.
More broadly, the documents show Amazon treating frontier AI models and GPU capacity as expensive resources to be deployed selectively rather than by default.
That philosophy echoes a point CEO Andy Jassy has made publicly. In his shareholder letter last year, Jassy argued there's an "urgency" to make AI inference dramatically less expensive.
"Reducing the cost per unit in AI will unleash AI being used as expansively as customers desire, and also lead to more overall AI spending," Jassy wrote.
Have a tip? Contact this reporter via email at [email protected] or Signal, Telegram, or WhatsApp at 650-942-3061. Use a personal email address, a nonwork WiFi network, and a nonwork device; here's our guide to sharing information securely.
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Eugene Kim You're currently following this author! Want to unfollow? Unsubscribe via the link in your email.
Eugene is Business Insider’s Chief Tech Correspondent, where he leads coverage of Amazon. His reporting spans the company’s retail operations, AWS, Alexa, and its secretive internal work culture.Previously, he worked at CNBC, Fortune Magazine Korea, and Japan's Yomiuri Shimbun. He holds degrees from NYU and Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism.In 2022, Eugene broke a story uncovering Amazon’s practice of deceptively enrolling customers in Prime and deliberately making cancellation difficult. A year later, the Federal Trade Commission sued the company, citing his reporting. That case culminated in a record $2.5 billion settlement in 2025.His reporting has earned multiple honors, including the SF Press Club’s Bay Area Journalism Award and SPJ NorCal’s Excellence in Journalism Award.Eugene lives in the Bay Area. Contact him via email at [email protected], or Signal, Telegram, or WhatsApp at 650-942-3061. Use a personal email address, a nonwork WiFi network, and a nonwork device; here's our guide to sharing information securely. ExpertiseAmazon, Jeff Bezos, Andy Jassy, e-commerce, and cloud computing.Popular ArticlesAmazon:Internal Amazon emails give an exclusive look at how CEO Andy Jassy has started to run the company, with obsessive attention to the retail business and what some employees feel is micromanagingAndy Jassy will be the next CEO of Amazon. Insiders dish on what it's like to work for Jeff Bezos' successor, who built AWS into a $40 billion business.Internal documents show Amazon has for years knowingly tricked people into signing up for Prime subscriptions. 'We have been deliberately confusing,' former employee says.Inside Amazon's flailing brick-and-mortar ambitions: missed projections, pressure to cut costs, and a war with Whole FoodsInside Amazon's complex employee-review system, where workers feel left in the dark and managers expect to give 5% of reports bad reviewsAfter 28 years, 'Day 2' finally arrives at AmazonAWS, Alexa, healthcare:Inside Amazon's struggle to break into the lucrative market for SaaS business applications, including an internal pitch to buy $38 billion HubSpotInside Amazon's struggle to crack Nvidia's AI-chip dominanceAmazon's AI data center dream runs into the reality of 'zombie' facilities, higher costs, and labor shortagesAmazon is gutting its voice assistant, Alexa. Employees describe a division in crisis and huge losses on 'a wasted opportunity.'Amazon is working on a new 'Remarkable Alexa,' but internal politics and technical issues plague the projectAmazon projected huge losses from its healthcare business in 2024, but strong sales growth, internal document reveals
Amazon Alexa AI More AWS Anthropic Generative AI Exclusive
Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ:AMZN) reports second-quarter earnings on July 30, and Bank of America is raising the bar ahead of the print, arguing AWS is accelerating faster than the Street expects.
BofA now projects second-quarter revenue of $198.8 billion and operating profit of $24.1 billion, both above consensus of $196.8 billion and $23.6 billion.
The upside case centers on AWS: the bank raised its growth estimate to 33% year over year, up from 31%, a 5-point acceleration from the first quarter.
The driver is surging demand from AI model providers, with Anthropic-related revenue and OpenAI models on Bedrock cited as key contributors.
AWS margins should expand year over year to 34% on strong capacity utilization and pricing, though they'll contract sequentially as stock-based compensation rises.
Retail looks steadier. Bank of America card data shows online spending accelerated 2 points sequentially, consistent with Street expectations for North American retail growth to reach 14% year over year, even as the Prime Day bump appeared more modest than in prior years. BofA also thinks Amazon could raise its 2026 capex outlook to $210 billion on higher memory costs.
For the third quarter, BofA expects revenue guidance of $200.5 billion to $205.5 billion, a midpoint just below the Street's $204 billion. That outlook bakes in a roughly $1 billion sequential decline in North American retail tied to Prime Day timing, offset by international growth and AWS accelerating to 36%, adding an estimated $3.8 billion sequentially.
On profit, BofA expects a guidance range of $21.5 billion to $26.5 billion, with a $24 billion midpoint, flattish sequentially and slightly below the Street's $25 billion. Amazon typically guides conservatively, but AWS acceleration should still drive sequential profit growth.
BofA's broader thesis is that results will showcase Amazon's improving AI positioning, including AWS acceleration, an expanding backlog reportedly including $100 billion tied to Anthropic, positive Bedrock datapoints, and margin benefits from Amazon's Trainium chips.
Amazon is paying out $1.5 billion to customers as part of its settlement with the FTC. STEFANI REYNOLDS/AFP via Getty Images Amazon is required to pay out $1.5 billion to affected customers as part of its FTC settlement — and you have less than a week left to claim your share.
The Federal Trade Commission sued Amazon in 2023, accusing the company of enrolling customers in Amazon Prime without their knowledge or consent and making it difficult for them to cancel.
Amazon settled with the FTC last year, agreeing to pay out a large sum to customers and a $1 billion civil penalty, for a total of $2.5 billion.
The settlement followed a Business Insider investigation that revealed Amazon Prime's sign-up tactics could be misleading.
Amazon issued automatic refunds to some eligible customers between November and December 2025. Additional eligible customers have until July 27, 2026, to request a refund.
Here's what you need to know about getting the payout.
How much is the Amazon Prime settlement payment?Affected customers can receive a refund for Amazon Prime subscription fees, up to $51.
Who is eligible to file a compensation claim from Amazon Prime?You are eligible to file a claim for the Amazon Prime lawsuit payout if you did not already receive an automatic refund and meet the following criteria:
You signed up for Amazon Prime in the US.You unintentionally enrolled in Prime through one of the sign-up processes challenged by the FTC between June 23, 2019, and June 23, 2025 (Amazon will use its records to determine whether you enrolled through an eligible process, referred to as a "challenged enrollment flow"); or you tried and failed to cancel through the online cancellation process during the same time period.You used fewer than 10 Prime benefits, such as shopping, delivery, and streaming, during a one-year period of having Prime.How do I claim the refund from Amazon Prime?You can file a claim by visiting the official website and clicking "File Claim."
If you received a mailed or emailed notice from Amazon, you should provide the Claim ID and PIN that you were assigned.
If you did not receive a notice but believe you are eligible for a refund, you can still submit a claim by providing your personal details and explaining how you believe you are eligible: either if you unintentionally enrolled in Prime or unsuccessfully tried to cancel during the relevant time period. Amazon says it will use its records to confirm if you meet the eligibility criteria.
How and when will I be paid?Amazon has 30 days to review claims after they are received. All payments are to be issued by September 2026.
Payments will be made by PayPal, Venmo, or mailed checks, depending on the customer's preference given when submitting the claim.
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Kelsey Vlamis You're currently following this author! Want to unfollow? Unsubscribe via the link in your email.
Kelsey is a senior reporter for Business Insider, where she covers business and tech news as well as stories about travel, luxury, and consulting.Her feature story "Disaster at 18,200 feet" received awards from the New York Press Club and the North American Travel Journalists Association, as well as honorable mention from the Society of American Travel Writers. It was also included on Longreads' and Pocket's best of 2022 lists. She has also received an American Journalism Online Award for her coverage on missing and murdered Indigenous people in Wyoming.She's appeared on CBS, NPR, NBC, and other outlets to discuss her work. She previously worked on the world news desk at the BBC in London and received a master's in journalism from Northwestern University.She can be reached by email at [email protected] or via the encrypted-messaging app Signal @kelseyv.21.Popular storiesDisaster on Denali: Inside a 1,000-foot fall on America's highest peakThrifting is more popular than ever. It's also never been worse.Rolex wouldn't service the vintage watch my mom inherited. Watchmakers say it happens all the time.A tiny, invasive bug and the climate crisis are changing how guitars are made, and shifting the course of music historyThe tourism free-for-all is overGovernment-run boarding schools were founded to 'civilize' Native Americans. Hundreds of dead children remain buried in the schoolyard graves.Meet the Texas minister who helps fly dozens of women to New Mexico every month to get abortionsPeople are flocking to Colorado for the great outdoors, but the air pollution is so bad, it's forcing many to stay insideInside Kabul: An aid worker reveals the devastating chaos that erupted during the US exit from Afghanistan
In the latest trading session, Amazon (AMZN - Free Report) closed at $244.85, marking a -1.09% move from the previous day. The stock trailed the S&P 500, which registered a daily loss of 0.14%. Elsewhere, the Dow lost 0.01%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq lost 0.57%.
The online retailer's shares have seen an increase of 5.74% over the last month, surpassing the Retail-Wholesale sector's gain of 0.45% and the S&P 500's gain of 0.25%.
The investment community will be closely monitoring the performance of Amazon in its forthcoming earnings report. The company is scheduled to release its earnings on July 30, 2026. In that report, analysts expect Amazon to post earnings of $1.82 per share. This would mark year-over-year growth of 8.33%. Meanwhile, the latest consensus estimate predicts the revenue to be $196.85 billion, indicating a 17.38% increase compared to the same quarter of the previous year.
In terms of the entire fiscal year, the Zacks Consensus Estimates predict earnings of $8.93 per share and a revenue of $826.74 billion, indicating changes of +24.55% and +15.32%, respectively, from the former year.
Investors should also take note of any recent adjustments to analyst estimates for Amazon. These revisions help to show the ever-changing nature of near-term business trends. Hence, positive alterations in estimates signify analyst optimism regarding the business and profitability.
Our research reveals that these estimate alterations are directly linked with the stock price performance in the near future. To utilize this, we have created the Zacks Rank, a proprietary model that integrates these estimate changes and provides a functional rating system.
The Zacks Rank system, which varies between #1 (Strong Buy) and #5 (Strong Sell), carries an impressive track record of exceeding expectations, confirmed by external audits, with stocks at #1 delivering an average annual return of +25% since 1988. The Zacks Consensus EPS estimate has moved 0.49% higher within the past month. At present, Amazon boasts a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy).
In the context of valuation, Amazon is at present trading with a Forward P/E ratio of 27.72. For comparison, its industry has an average Forward P/E of 17.14, which means Amazon is trading at a premium to the group.
Meanwhile, AMZN's PEG ratio is currently 1.6. This metric is used similarly to the famous P/E ratio, but the PEG ratio also takes into account the stock's expected earnings growth rate. As of the close of trade yesterday, the Internet - Commerce industry held an average PEG ratio of 1.12.
The Internet - Commerce industry is part of the Retail-Wholesale sector. This industry currently has a Zacks Industry Rank of 161, which puts it in the bottom 35% of all 250+ industries.
The Zacks Industry Rank gauges the strength of our industry groups by measuring the average Zacks Rank of the individual stocks within the groups. Our research shows that the top 50% rated industries outperform the bottom half by a factor of 2 to 1.
Don't forget to use Zacks.com to keep track of all these stock-moving metrics, and others, in the upcoming trading sessions.
by Todd Bishop on Jul 22, 2026 at 11:41 amJuly 22, 2026 at 11:41 am
GeekWire File Photo Amazon confirmed Wednesday that it laid off an unspecified number of employees in its artificial general intelligence (AGI) organization, the division working on the company’s advanced AI models.
The move, first reported by Reuters, comes as the company invests heavily in programs to help businesses implement AI effectively, including a $1 billion initiative to embed AWS engineers with customers building agentic AI systems.
It’s part of a larger shift in the industry as tech giants and AI frontier labs look to make sure the enormous sums they’re spending on AI pay off in tools businesses actually use.
In a statement, an Amazon spokesperson said building large AI models remains “one of the most important things we’re working on,” but said the company is also “sharpening our focus on the initiatives that matter most for customers, so we can move faster on what counts.”
“That focus means some difficult decisions, including eliminating some roles within parts of our AGI organization, even as we continue to invest in the areas most important to our customers’ future,” the spokesperson said.
It’s the latest in a series of changes in Amazon’s AGI group, which despite its name has always been focused more on frontier models than on what the industry considers AGI, the still-theoretical systems that would match or surpass human intelligence.
Rohit Prasad, the senior executive who oversaw Amazon’s AGI work, left the company late last year, and AGI Lab head David Luan departed in February. In December, Amazon folded the AGI group into a larger organization led by senior vice president Peter DeSantis that also includes chip development and quantum computing.
The cuts are the latest in a series of smaller reductions since January, when Amazon eliminated 16,000 jobs across the company. Amazon said U.S. employees whose jobs are cut will receive 90 days of pay and benefits, outplacement support and transitional health coverage, along with eligibility for severance.
Previous StoryGame developer Harebrained Schemes kicks off its new indie era with survival-horror RPG ‘GRAFT’
Amazon (AMZN, Financials) has been slashing jobs in its artificial general intelligence group as it reconsiders its AI development endeavors.The organization is
Amazon Earnings: What Wall Street Will Be WatchingThe brokerage reiterated its Buy rating and $310 price forecast, citing improving AI positioning, accelerating AWS growth and continued momentum in generative AI services as potential catalysts for the stock in the second half of 2026.
Bank of America now expects Amazon to report second-quarter revenue of $198.8 billion and operating income of $24.1 billion, above Wall Street consensus estimates of $196.8 billion and $23.6 billion, respectively.
The firm also raised its AWS revenue growth forecast to 33% year over year, up from its prior estimate of 31%, driven by growing demand from Anthropic, OpenAI-powered Bedrock services and broader enterprise AI adoption.
AWS Growth Remains The Key FocusAnalysts expect Amazon’s third-quarter revenue guidance to range between $200.5 billion and $205.5 billion, roughly bracketing Street expectations.
They noted that an earlier-than-usual Prime Day will likely create a headwind for third-quarter retail comparisons after shifting some sales into the second quarter.
The firm said investors should focus less on headline earnings and more on AWS growth, cloud margins, AI backlog expansion and commentary around capital spending.
Bank of America believes Amazon’s cloud business continues to strengthen relative to competitors, supported by Bedrock adoption, Trainium chips and growing AI workloads.
AI Spending And Anthropic PartnershipThe brokerage also said Amazon could increase its 2026 capital expenditure outlook to about $210 billion because of higher memory costs and additional AI infrastructure investment.
While that could weigh on near-term sentiment, analysts said stronger cloud demand and improving AI monetization should outweigh those concerns over time.
Bank of America added that Amazon’s expanding relationship with Anthropic could further boost results. The firm estimates Anthropic-related workloads alone could contribute more than $1.5 billion in sequential AWS revenue growth during the quarter, while Amazon’s stake in the AI startup could generate a significant mark-to-market gain.
Wall Street Remains Bullish Ahead Of EarningsAmazon is scheduled to report second-quarter results on July 30.
Wall Street expects earnings of $1.82 per share, up from $1.68 a year earlier. Revenue is projected to reach $196.02 billion, compared with $167.70 billion in the prior-year quarter.
The stock trades at about 29.6 times forward earnings. Analysts maintain a Buy consensus rating with an average price forecast of $320.10. Recent analyst actions include:
Wells Fargo reiterated Overweight and raised its price forecast to $322 on July 21. KeyBanc maintained Overweight and increased its price forecast to $335 on July 16. Wedbush reiterated Outperform with a $293 price forecast on July 16. Amazon ETF ExposureAmazon is a major holding in several exchange-traded funds, including:
Large fund flows into or out of these ETFs can influence Amazon’s share price because of its significant portfolio weighting.
Amazon Price ActionAMZN Stock Price Activity: Amazon.com shares were down 1.47% at $243.91 at the time of publication on Wednesday, according to Benzinga Pro data.
Photo via Shutterstock
Market News and Data brought to you by Benzinga APIs
Amazon is laying off some employees in its unit focused on artificial general intelligence, the company confirmed Wednesday, as it continues to cut jobs while pouring money into AI.
The company declined to disclose how many staffers were affected, or which parts of the AGI organization were exposed to the cuts. The AGI unit is focused on building AI models, and also includes groups working on silicon development and quantum computing initiatives.
"This is a fast-moving space, and we're sharpening our focus on the initiatives that matter most for customers, so we can move faster on what counts," an Amazon spokesperson told CNBC in a statement. "That focus means some difficult decisions, including eliminating some roles within parts of our AGI organization, even as we continue to invest in the areas most important to our customers' future."
Reuters first reported the layoffs.
Amazon has been downsizing over the past several years following a pandemic hiring binge, and as it commits massive sums to building out AI infrastructure. The company has laid off more than 30,000 staffers since last October, and has continued to eliminate roles through smaller rounds in recent months.
The AGI unit is a core part of Amazon's AI strategy as the company tries to keep pace with leaders OpenAI, Anthropic and Google. AGI generally refers to AI that can perform as well or better than humans on most tasks.
In 2024, Amazon's AGI group released a set of foundation models, called Nova. The unit took on a more expansive focus last December when Amazon tapped longtime cloud executive Peter DeSantis to replace Rohit Prasad as the head of the group.
In February, the company lost the head of its AGI lab, David Luan, who joined Amazon in 2024 through a so-called acquihire of his startup Adept.
Amazon's spokesperson said the company has been building large AI models for several years and "it remains one of the most important things we're working on."
DeSantis acknowledged in an interview with CNBC last month that Amazon's models "haven't been at the very frontier for the very largest, most demanding workloads."
He said Amazon has been working to shore up its models further and it hopes to have one of the "most capable intelligent models out there."
Amazon is scheduled to report second-quarter results next week. The company has forecast capital expenditures for the year of $200 billion, an increase of more than 50% from 2025, and is raising tens of billions of dollars in debt to help fund its AI buildout.
Amazon has cut jobs in its artificial general intelligence (AGI) group, Reuters reported Wednesday (July 22).
The move follows Amazon’s consolidation of AGI work into part of a larger group that also includes silicon development and quantum computing in December 2025, the departure of AGI-focused executive Rohit Prasad at the end of 2025, and the departure of AGI lab leader David Luan in February, according to the report.
It’s also one of a series of smaller workforce reductions Amazon has made since a much bigger round of layoffs in January, the report said.
Employees reported being impacted by the cuts in the AGI group in posts on online forums Wednesday, but the scope of the cuts is not clear, per the report.
Asked about the reports by Reuters, an Amazon spokesperson said: “We’ve been building large AI models for several years, and it remains one of the most important things we’re working on. We’re sharpening our focus on the initiatives that matter most for customers, so we can move faster on what counts. That focus means some difficult decisions, including eliminating some roles within parts of our AGI organization.”
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy announced in a Dec. 17, 2025 message that the AGI team was being included in a newly formed organization that brought together the company’s AI models, silicon development and quantum computing, and is led by Peter DeSantis.
Jassy also said in the message that Prasad, who led the creation of the AGI organization over the previous two years, had decided to leave Amazon.
“The path ahead is full of opportunity,” Jassy said in the message. “With the foundation that’s been built, the traction we’re seeing, and Peter’s leadership bringing unified focus to these technologies, we’re well-positioned to lead and deliver meaningful capabilities for our customers. I’m excited about what this team will build and how these foundational technologies will help shape Amazon’s future.”
AGI refers to the development of intelligent machines that can think, learn and perform any intellectual task that a human can, PYMNTS reported in April 2024. Unlike AI systems that are designed to excel at specific tasks, AGI aims to create machines that can think and reason like humans, adapt to new challenges and learn from experience.
Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ:AMZN) reports second-quarter earnings on July 30, and Bank of America is raising the bar ahead of the print, arguing AWS is accelerating faster than the Street expects.
BofA now projects second-quarter revenue of $198.8 billion and operating profit of $24.1 billion, both above consensus of $196.8 billion and $23.6 billion.
The upside case centers on AWS: the bank raised its growth estimate to 33% year over year, up from 31%, a 5-point acceleration from the first quarter.
The driver is surging demand from AI model providers, with Anthropic-related revenue and OpenAI models on Bedrock cited as key contributors.
AWS margins should expand year over year to 34% on strong capacity utilization and pricing, though they'll contract sequentially as stock-based compensation rises.
Retail looks steadier. Bank of America card data shows online spending accelerated 2 points sequentially, consistent with Street expectations for North American retail growth to reach 14% year over year, even as the Prime Day bump appeared more modest than in prior years. BofA also thinks Amazon could raise its 2026 capex outlook to $210 billion on higher memory costs.
For the third quarter, BofA expects revenue guidance of $200.5 billion to $205.5 billion, a midpoint just below the Street's $204 billion. That outlook bakes in a roughly $1 billion sequential decline in North American retail tied to Prime Day timing, offset by international growth and AWS accelerating to 36%, adding an estimated $3.8 billion sequentially.
On profit, BofA expects a guidance range of $21.5 billion to $26.5 billion, with a $24 billion midpoint, flattish sequentially and slightly below the Street's $25 billion. Amazon typically guides conservatively, but AWS acceleration should still drive sequential profit growth.
BofA's broader thesis is that results will showcase Amazon's improving AI positioning, including AWS acceleration, an expanding backlog reportedly including $100 billion tied to Anthropic, positive Bedrock datapoints, and margin benefits from Amazon's Trainium chips.
Item 1 of 2 The logo of Amazon is pictured at a company logistics center in Carquefou near Nantes, westren France, May 6, 2026. REUTERS/Stephane Mahe
[1/2]The logo of Amazon is pictured at a company logistics center in Carquefou near Nantes, westren France, May 6, 2026. REUTERS/Stephane Mahe Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab
SAN FRANCISCO, July 22 (Reuters) - Amazon (AMZN.O), opens new tab on Wednesday cut jobs in its artificial general intelligence group, marking the latest in a series of smaller reductions across the company since a much larger one in January.
Artificial general intelligence is a hypothetical AI system that surpasses human intelligence and can learn, grow and operate autonomously. Many of the top AI companies are working to develop similar systems, with the hope of deploying them to solve difficult problems.
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"We've been building large AI models for several years, and it remains one of the most important things we're working on," said an Amazon spokesman following a Reuters inquiry. "We’re sharpening our focus on the initiatives that matter most for customers, so we can move faster on what counts. That focus means some difficult decisions, including eliminating some roles within parts of our AGI organization."
Rohit Prasad, a top Amazon executive overseeing AGI, left the company at the end of last year and the head of its AGI Lab, David Luan, left in February. AGI work was consolidated under senior vice president Peter DeSantis in December as part of a larger group that also includes silicon development and quantum computing.
Employees under Adeeb Shanaa, vice president of artificial general intelligence data services, and Vishal Sharma, vice president of AGI information, reported being impacted by the cuts on online forums on Wednesday. However, the full scope of the cuts could not immediately be learned.
Amazon cut 16,000 jobs across the company in January.
Reporting by Greg Bensinger; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama, Kirsten Donovan
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab
Greg Bensinger joined Reuters as a technology correspondent in 2022 focusing on the world's largest technology companies. He was previously a member of The New York Times editorial board and a technology beat reporter for The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal. He also worked for Bloomberg News writing about the auto and telecommunications industries. He studied English literature at The University of Virginia and graduate journalism at Columbia University. Greg lives in San Francisco with his wife and two children.
On July 30, Amazon (AMZN -1.45%) reports earnings, and I think its CEO, Andy Jassy, will drop a bombshell that nobody is expecting. Amazon has been spending heavily on data center capital expenditures and is currently projected to spend about $200 billion this year -- the most of any artificial intelligence (AI) hyperscaler. All of that spending is now translating into increased computing capacity, which allows clients desperate for more computing power to spend more.
This will cause Amazon Web Services' (AWS) revenue to skyrocket, significantly boosting Amazon's overall growth and profit picture. This could create the perfect storm that sends the stock price skyrocketing, and I think investors would be smart to get in before July 30.
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy. Image source: Amazon.com Inc.
AWS is Amazon's primary business AWS may seem like an afterthought for a company that was built on commerce sales, but the numbers argue it should be considered Amazon's primary business. Although it accounted for only 21% of Amazon's total sales during the first quarter, it accounted for 59% of profits. Furthermore, it was the fastest-growing segment within Amazon, further solidifying its case for being considered Amazon's primary business.
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It's rare for a wide-reaching business like Amazon to have a segment that's both the most profitable and the fastest-growing, with the largest opportunity. And Amazon is spending heavily to ensure it captures as much market share as possible. Amazon also isn't doing this without some commitment from clients. Jassy informed investors in his annual shareholder letter that most of this new computing capacity is already contracted, limiting the risk of overbuilding.
However, 2026 is just the beginning. All signs point to more expansion in the coming years, and if there is more demand for AI computing capacity, then AWS and its cloud computing peers are set to cash in. Should AWS have a blowout quarter and see its revenue accelerate to something in the mid-30% range, I think the market will reward Amazon's stock by sending shares higher. With the stock trading at a fair price of 28.4 times forward earnings, I think it can rise a bit without looking overvalued.
Data by YCharts.
Amazon is a great stock to buy and hold in the AI era thanks to its AWS platform. I expect great news from Amazon on July 30, but we'll have to wait and see how the market reacts to it.
Keithen Drury has positions in Amazon. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Amazon. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
Amazon logo outside an Amazon warehouse in Manchester, Britain, October 28, 2025. REUTERS/Phil Noble/File Photo Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab
CompaniesMILAN, July 22 (Reuters) - Italian unions have signed an agreement with Amazon.com (AMZN.O), opens new tab covering leave, employee rights and video surveillance, the unions and the U.S. e-commerce giant said on Wednesday.
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The Filt CGIL, Fit CISL and Uiltrasporti unions said 57 sites operating in Italy were covered in the deal struck with Amazon Italia Transport and Amazon Italia Logistica and hailed it as the first such national collective agreement reached with Amazon in any country.
Regarding video surveillance, the unions said it has been agreed that images cannot be used for disciplinary purposes.
Employees have been granted the right to take parental leave in increments as small as a single hour, the unions added.
"We welcome the agreement reached with trade unions, which introduces new flexibility and work-life balance tools and enhances existing ones, bringing them into a shared framework for the benefit of our employees and their families," Amazon said in a statement.
The agreement builds on an initial protocol signed with Amazon in 2021.
Amazon has 19,000 permanent employees in Italy.
Writing by Keith Weir, editing by Alvise Armellini
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab
Amazon said it remains committed to investing in AI, describing the layoffs as part of an effort to prioritize the initiatives it believes will have the greatest impact for customers.
I keep pressing the buy button on Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN | AMZN Price Prediction), and the reason is embarrassingly simple: the crowd is looking at the capex line and flinching, while I am looking at what that capex actually builds.
That is the whole thesis in one sentence. Amazon is spending in 2026 to own the compute layer of the AI economy in 2027 and beyond. The market treats the near-term free cash flow squeeze as a wound. I read it as a receipt.
The Three Numbers That Keep Me Buying Start with AWS. In Q1 2026 it grew 28% year over year, fastest in 15 quarters, on a $150 billion run rate. Jassy said “It is very unusual for a business to grow this fast on a base this large.” Segment operating margin 37.7%, operating income $14.2 billion. That is the engine.
Next, chips. Amazon’s silicon business (Graviton, Trainium, Nitro) topped a $20 billion revenue run rate growing triple digits year over year. Trainium2 is largely sold out. OpenAI committed to roughly 2 GW of Trainium capacity beginning in 2027. Anthropic secured up to 5 GW. AWS backlog sits at $364 billion, and that excludes an Anthropic commitment for over $100 billion.
Third, the whole business prints. Q1 EPS came in at $2.78 versus a $1.653 estimate, a 68.18% beat, the fifth straight beat. Operating income $23.85 billion, up 29.6% YoY. Operating cash flow $26.03 billion, up 52.99%. ROE 22.29%, net debt to EBITDA 0.45, interest coverage 35.17x.
The stock closed at $247.55, up 7.25% YTD, while AMZN slipped 4.7% since the April filing. Analyst target is $312.87 with 62 buys and zero sells.
Why Not the Obvious Alternatives Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) and Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) are the obvious cloud picks. Amazon leads both on custom AI training silicon at Trainium’s scale. Its chip business is over $20 billion run rate with more than $225 billion in revenue commitments and OpenAI plus Anthropic locked in. Jassy: “Trainium will save us tens of billions of dollars of CapEx each year and provide several hundred basis points of operating margin advantage.”
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Walmart (NYSE:WMT) is the retail comp. Amazon’s Online Stores grew 12%, third-party sellers 14%, and unit growth hit 15%, the highest since COVID. Walmart does not carry a $150 billion cloud business alongside that.
Meta (NASDAQ:META) is the ad alternative. Amazon’s ad segment ran $17.24 billion in Q1, up 24% YoY, with over $70 billion TTM. One AMZN share buys three growth engines.
The Real Risk TTM free cash flow fell to $1.2 billion, down 95%. Q1 capex was $44.2 billion; the 2026 plan is roughly $200 billion. Long-term debt climbed to $119.1 billion from $65.6 billion. If AI monetization slips, that overhang stings.
Jassy addressed it directly: data centers carry 30-plus year lives, chips and servers five to six years. I am fine with a compressed FCF year sitting behind $364 billion of backlog.
What Keeps the Buy Button Active Polymarket assigns 98.5% probability to 2026 capex exceeding $170 billion. Consensus has accepted the number without repricing the outcome. That gap is my window. The five-year base case models $523.92, a 111.64% total return. I keep buying because 2027 will not send an invitation.
Act now: the analyst who called NVIDIA in 2010 just named his top 10 AI stocks — and Amazon didn't make the cut. Grab the names FREE today.
The streaming-content industry is entering a new phase. Subscriber growth and exclusive programming still matter, but the competitive focus has broadened toward advertising, live sports, creator-led video and distribution control. Platforms increasingly resemble digital television networks, combining on-demand libraries with scheduled events, targeted advertising, paid upgrades and channel bundles.
The shift favors companies that are able to monetize the same audience through several channels rather than relying solely on monthly subscription fees. Alphabet Inc. (GOOGL - Free Report) , Amazon.com, Inc. (AMZN - Free Report) and Fox Corporation (FOXA - Free Report) approach that transition from different starting points, but each owns assets that could benefit as television audiences fragment across digital platforms.
The change is visible in viewing data. Streaming captured a record 47.5% of U.S. television use in December 2025, according to Nielsen, while Christmas Day generated more than 55 billion streaming minutes. In the first quarter of 2026, streaming accounted for a record 46.6% of ad-supported television viewing. These figures matter because advertising dollars generally follow audience attention, although measurement changes and seasonal events can cause meaningful month-to-month volatility.
Live programming is becoming an especially important differentiator. Nielsen’s Gracenote reported in May 2026 that sports represented 5% of programming across leading global subscription-streaming catalogs and was the fastest-growing content category it tracked. Sports can attract large audiences at predictable times, reduce churn and provide premium advertising inventory. At the same time, free ad-supported streaming television (FAST) is expanding the addressable market among viewers unwilling to add another paid service.
The medium-term outlook remains constructive, but the industry is not becoming easier. Content and sports-rights costs are rising, consumers can switch services quickly, and advertisers have numerous digital alternatives. Regulators are also scrutinizing platform power, data practices and large media combinations. However, within that environment, Alphabet, which offers creator-led scale through YouTube; Amazon, which links streaming to Prime and commerce; and Fox, which provides focused exposure to free streaming and connected-TV advertising, are poised to excel.
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Alphabet established a position in online video through its 2006 acquisition of YouTube. Originally centered on user-uploaded clips, YouTube has evolved into an entertainment platform offering short videos, long-form creator content, music, podcasts, films, live television and professional sports. This range sets it apart from streaming services focused on studio-produced movies and series.
YouTube also reflects the industry’s move toward diversified monetization. It earns advertising revenues across phones, computers and connected TVs while generating subscription income from YouTube Premium, YouTube Music, YouTube TV and NFL Sunday Ticket. Because creators provide much of the content and share advertising revenues, Alphabet relies less on a traditional studio production model.
Audience scale remains the central advantage. YouTube said it had ranked first in U.S. streaming watch time for nearly three years as of January 2026, while YouTube Shorts was averaging more than 200 billion daily views. Nielsen subsequently reported that YouTube held 13.4% of total U.S. television watch time in April 2026, the largest share among measured media distributors. This TV presence helps Alphabet compete for brand advertising once dominated by broadcast and cable.
Future growth may come from connected-TV ads, subscriptions, new channel packages and AI-powered tools. Key risks include regulation, moderation challenges, competition, infrastructure costs and sports rights. Still, YouTube’s creator ecosystem, advertising technology and distribution make it difficult to replicate. Alphabet sports a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.
Amazon’s digital-video history dates to the September 2006 launch of Amazon Unbox, a download service offering programming from more than 30 studio and network partners. The company later integrated streaming into Prime and expanded its content ownership, most notably through the $8.45 billion MGM transaction. MGM brought a library exceeding 4,000 films and 17,000 television episodes, along with franchises, including James Bond, Rocky and Creed.
Streaming supports Prime retention, advertising, distribution, rentals and channel subscriptions. Its advantage is integration with Amazon’s ecosystem. Amazon can promote programs through its storefront and Fire TV devices as viewers move among included content, channels and rentals. Unlike pure-play streamers, returns can include commerce and customer engagement, and not only video revenues.
Nielsen estimated that Prime Video represented 4.2% of U.S. television viewing in April 2026, helped by 22 NBA games and the final season of The Boys. This suggests that sports can lift engagement beyond the release windows of scripted originals. Amazon’s advertising-services revenues reached $17.24 billion in the first quarter, rising 24% year over year, although the company does not disclose how much came from Prime Video rather than retail advertising.
Live sports, franchise development, international distribution and ad-supported viewing are key catalysts. While investors should nevertheless account for heavy investment requirements, Amazon remains notable because Prime Video can reinforce several businesses at once, making it strategically valuable even when standalone economics are difficult to isolate. AMZN has a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy).
Fox took its present form after selling major assets to Disney in 2019. Rather than launching a subscription platform, the company bought Tubi for $440 million in 2020 and focused on free, ad-supported streaming alongside its news, sports and broadcast television businesses.
This approach appeals to viewers reluctant to add another monthly fee. Tubi now serves more than 100 million monthly active users, offering an on-demand library as well as original productions and creator-driven programming.
Nielsen reported that Tubi reached a platform-best 2.3% of U.S. television viewing in April 2026, with viewing up 3% from March. A partnership unveiled in March 2026 enables selected TikTok creators to produce exclusive long-form series for Tubi, helping Fox turn social-media talent into television-style content without incurring the production costs of premium scripted rivals.
Fox’s planned acquisition of Roku, announced in June 2026, could strengthen its connected-TV distribution, advertising capabilities and direct audience relationships. The company projects roughly $400 million in annualized cost synergies, although the transaction still requires shareholder and regulatory approval and is expected to close in the first half of 2027.
The combination could unite Fox’s live news and sports, Tubi’s catalog and Roku’s platform data. Key opportunities include audience growth, better ad targeting and Fox One, while risks include integration, leverage, regulation and pressure on traditional television. FOXA holds a Zacks Rank #2.
Accredited Investors Inc. reduced its stake in Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) by 2.9% during the 1st quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 222,751 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock after selling 6,653 shares during the period. Amazon.com accounts for about 2.5% of Accredited Investors Inc.’s holdings, making the stock its 13th biggest position. Accredited Investors Inc.’s holdings in Amazon.com were worth $46,392,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.
A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. MilWealth Group LLC increased its holdings in shares of Amazon.com by 79.0% in the fourth quarter. MilWealth Group LLC now owns 179 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock valued at $41,000 after purchasing an additional 79 shares during the period. Lifetime Wealth Management P.C. acquired a new stake in shares of Amazon.com during the fourth quarter worth $45,000. Elkhorn Partners Limited Partnership lifted its holdings in shares of Amazon.com by 900.0% during the fourth quarter. Elkhorn Partners Limited Partnership now owns 200 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $46,000 after purchasing an additional 180 shares during the period. Fairway Wealth LLC grew its position in Amazon.com by 95.6% in the 4th quarter. Fairway Wealth LLC now owns 221 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock valued at $51,000 after buying an additional 108 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Prudent Man Investment Management Inc. grew its position in Amazon.com by 87.7% in the 4th quarter. Prudent Man Investment Management Inc. now owns 229 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock valued at $53,000 after buying an additional 107 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 72.20% of the company’s stock.
Insider Buying and Selling In related news, VP Shelley Reynolds sold 2,363 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, May 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $262.38, for a total value of $620,003.94. Following the sale, the vice president owned 119,780 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $31,427,876.40. This represents a 1.93% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, CEO Douglas J. Herrington sold 1,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Wednesday, July 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $239.77, for a total value of $239,770.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer directly owned 484,527 shares in the company, valued at approximately $116,175,038.79. The trade was a 0.21% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Over the last ninety days, insiders have sold 144,274 shares of company stock valued at $38,716,204. 8.90% of the stock is owned by company insiders.
Trending Headlines about Amazon.com Here are the key news stories impacting Amazon.com this week:
Positive Sentiment: Amazon Business reached a $60 billion annualized sales run rate, with more than 1.8 million organizations joining in the first half of the year, reinforcing the strength of Amazon’s B2B platform. Amazon Business Hits $60 Billion in Annualized Sales Positive Sentiment: Multiple articles highlighted Amazon as an attractive AI cloud stock, citing AWS growth, a lower valuation than Microsoft, and improving sentiment around Amazon’s AI infrastructure buildout. Amazon vs. Microsoft: Which AI Cloud Titan Is the Better Investment? Positive Sentiment: Analysts and commentators continued to argue that Amazon is undervalued relative to its AI capex plans, with bullish takes focused on AWS, Trainium chips, and the company’s strategic position in artificial intelligence. Is Amazon.com (AMZN) Undervalued Following Its $200b AI Infrastructure Push? Neutral Sentiment: Amazon also got publicity from Jeff Bezos-related and Amazon-marketplace stories, plus a new satellite-business finance hire, but these items are unlikely to move the stock much by themselves. Amazon taps Alexa executive as Leo satellite business’s first finance VP Neutral Sentiment: Bill Ackman reportedly called Amazon a “cheap stock,” adding to the bullish long-term narrative, but this is more sentiment support than a direct catalyst. Bill Ackman Says META and AMZN Are ‘Cheap Stocks’ Despite Their Massive Size Negative Sentiment: A separate report said Amazon may be losing some competitive edge on delivery speed, which could reinforce worries about retail margin pressure and execution. Amazon may be losing its biggest competitive edge Negative Sentiment: Some coverage focused on Amazon’s large AI spending plans and shrinking free cash flow, suggesting investors are still skeptical that the capex will translate into near-term profits. Big Tech Is Minting Mountains of Cash — But Amazon’s Is Vanishing Negative Sentiment: There was also an article warning that Amazon’s cash-flow picture needs watching ahead of earnings, keeping attention on whether the AI and cloud investments are paying off fast enough. Amazon’s (AMZN) AI Strategy Continues to Grow, but Cash Flow Needs Watching Amazon.com Stock Performance AMZN opened at $247.55 on Wednesday. The stock has a market cap of $2.66 trillion, a P/E ratio of 29.61, a P/E/G ratio of 1.86 and a beta of 1.46. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27, a current ratio of 1.18 and a quick ratio of 1.01. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $250.08 and its 200 day simple moving average is $236.20. Amazon.com, Inc. has a 1-year low of $196.00 and a 1-year high of $278.56.
Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN – Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, April 29th. The e-commerce giant reported $2.78 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.63 by $1.15. Amazon.com had a return on equity of 19.92% and a net margin of 12.22%.The firm had revenue of $181.52 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $177.28 billion. During the same period last year, the business posted $1.59 EPS. Amazon.com’s quarterly revenue was up 16.6% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that Amazon.com, Inc. will post 7.75 EPS for the current fiscal year.
Analyst Ratings Changes A number of equities analysts have commented on AMZN shares. DA Davidson upped their price objective on shares of Amazon.com from $175.00 to $250.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, April 30th. Guggenheim reissued a “buy” rating and set a $320.00 price target (up from $300.00) on shares of Amazon.com in a report on Thursday, April 30th. China Renaissance raised their price objective on shares of Amazon.com from $300.00 to $326.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, May 5th. Canaccord Genuity Group increased their target price on Amazon.com from $300.00 to $330.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 30th. Finally, Royal Bank Of Canada reissued a “buy” rating on shares of Amazon.com in a report on Tuesday, June 16th. Fifty-seven analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Amazon.com currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $312.91.
View Our Latest Report on AMZN
About Amazon.com (Free Report)
Amazon.com, Inc is a diversified technology and retail company best known for its e-commerce marketplace and broad portfolio of consumer and enterprise services. Founded by Jeff Bezos in 1994 and headquartered in Seattle, Washington, the company launched as an online bookseller and expanded into a global retail platform that sells products directly to consumers and provides a marketplace for third-party sellers. Over time Amazon has grown beyond retail into areas including cloud computing, digital media, devices and logistics.
Key businesses and offerings include Amazon’s online marketplace and fulfillment services, the Amazon Prime membership program (which bundles expedited shipping with streaming and other benefits), Amazon Web Services (AWS) which supplies on-demand cloud computing and storage to businesses and public-sector customers, and a range of content and advertising services such as Prime Video and Amazon Advertising.
Further Reading Five stocks we like better than Amazon.com Confidence Is Back, But Earnings Show the Consumer Is Being Picky AeroVironment’s Stock Is Down, But Drone Demand Is Taking Off 3M’s Redemption Arc: Can Q2 Earnings Change the Narrative? 3 Photonics Companies Making Quantum Tech Possible Want to see what other hedge funds are holding AMZN? Visit HoldingsChannel.com to get the latest 13F filings and insider trades for Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN – Free Report).
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Beacon Financial Group cut its holdings in Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN – Free Report) by 9.7% during the 1st quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 28,638 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock after selling 3,063 shares during the quarter. Beacon Financial Group’s holdings in Amazon.com were worth $5,964,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.
A number of other hedge funds have also modified their holdings of the business. Red Crane Wealth Management LLC raised its stake in Amazon.com by 2.3% in the 1st quarter. Red Crane Wealth Management LLC now owns 1,663 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock valued at $346,000 after purchasing an additional 38 shares during the last quarter. Lifelong Wealth Advisors Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Amazon.com by 2.4% during the fourth quarter. Lifelong Wealth Advisors Inc. now owns 1,740 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $402,000 after purchasing an additional 41 shares during the last quarter. Financial Connections Group Inc. boosted its stake in Amazon.com by 2.6% in the 4th quarter. Financial Connections Group Inc. now owns 1,633 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $376,000 after buying an additional 42 shares during the last quarter. Marquette Asset Management LLC boosted its position in shares of Amazon.com by 5.1% in the fourth quarter. Marquette Asset Management LLC now owns 886 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $205,000 after acquiring an additional 43 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Wernau Asset Management Inc. raised its stake in Amazon.com by 0.4% during the first quarter. Wernau Asset Management Inc. now owns 10,231 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $2,131,000 after purchasing an additional 43 shares during the period. 72.20% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.
Wall Street Analyst Weigh In Several analysts have recently issued reports on AMZN shares. TD Cowen reissued a “buy” rating and set a $340.00 price objective (down from $350.00) on shares of Amazon.com in a research note on Wednesday, July 8th. Monness Crespi & Hardt upped their price target on Amazon.com from $280.00 to $315.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 30th. Mizuho lifted their price objective on Amazon.com from $315.00 to $325.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, April 28th. Guggenheim restated a “buy” rating and issued a $320.00 price target (up from $300.00) on shares of Amazon.com in a report on Thursday, April 30th. Finally, DA Davidson lifted their price target on shares of Amazon.com from $175.00 to $250.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, April 30th. Fifty-seven equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have issued a Hold rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Amazon.com has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $312.91.
Check Out Our Latest Stock Report on Amazon.com
Amazon.com Stock Performance Shares of AMZN stock opened at $247.55 on Wednesday. Amazon.com, Inc. has a 12 month low of $196.00 and a 12 month high of $278.56. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27, a current ratio of 1.18 and a quick ratio of 1.01. The firm has a market capitalization of $2.66 trillion, a P/E ratio of 29.61, a P/E/G ratio of 1.86 and a beta of 1.46. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $250.08 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $236.20.
Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN – Get Free Report) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, April 29th. The e-commerce giant reported $2.78 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.63 by $1.15. Amazon.com had a return on equity of 19.92% and a net margin of 12.22%.The company had revenue of $181.52 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $177.28 billion. During the same period last year, the firm earned $1.59 earnings per share. The company’s revenue was up 16.6% on a year-over-year basis. On average, research analysts anticipate that Amazon.com, Inc. will post 7.75 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.
Insider Transactions at Amazon.com In other news, SVP David Zapolsky sold 9,270 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, May 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $268.53, for a total transaction of $2,489,273.10. Following the completion of the transaction, the senior vice president directly owned 41,190 shares in the company, valued at approximately $11,060,750.70. This represents a 18.37% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, Director Jonathan Rubinstein sold 3,849 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, April 24th. The stock was sold at an average price of $260.00, for a total transaction of $1,000,740.00. Following the sale, the director directly owned 78,654 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $20,450,040. The trade was a 4.67% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders have sold a total of 144,274 shares of company stock valued at $38,716,204 in the last three months. 8.90% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.
Key Amazon.com News Here are the key news stories impacting Amazon.com this week:
Positive Sentiment: Amazon Business reached a $60 billion annualized sales run rate, with more than 1.8 million organizations joining in the first half of the year, reinforcing the strength of Amazon’s B2B platform. Amazon Business Hits $60 Billion in Annualized Sales Positive Sentiment: Multiple articles highlighted Amazon as an attractive AI cloud stock, citing AWS growth, a lower valuation than Microsoft, and improving sentiment around Amazon’s AI infrastructure buildout. Amazon vs. Microsoft: Which AI Cloud Titan Is the Better Investment? Positive Sentiment: Analysts and commentators continued to argue that Amazon is undervalued relative to its AI capex plans, with bullish takes focused on AWS, Trainium chips, and the company’s strategic position in artificial intelligence. Is Amazon.com (AMZN) Undervalued Following Its $200b AI Infrastructure Push? Neutral Sentiment: Amazon also got publicity from Jeff Bezos-related and Amazon-marketplace stories, plus a new satellite-business finance hire, but these items are unlikely to move the stock much by themselves. Amazon taps Alexa executive as Leo satellite business’s first finance VP Neutral Sentiment: Bill Ackman reportedly called Amazon a “cheap stock,” adding to the bullish long-term narrative, but this is more sentiment support than a direct catalyst. Bill Ackman Says META and AMZN Are ‘Cheap Stocks’ Despite Their Massive Size Negative Sentiment: A separate report said Amazon may be losing some competitive edge on delivery speed, which could reinforce worries about retail margin pressure and execution. Amazon may be losing its biggest competitive edge Negative Sentiment: Some coverage focused on Amazon’s large AI spending plans and shrinking free cash flow, suggesting investors are still skeptical that the capex will translate into near-term profits. Big Tech Is Minting Mountains of Cash — But Amazon’s Is Vanishing Negative Sentiment: There was also an article warning that Amazon’s cash-flow picture needs watching ahead of earnings, keeping attention on whether the AI and cloud investments are paying off fast enough. Amazon’s (AMZN) AI Strategy Continues to Grow, but Cash Flow Needs Watching Amazon.com Profile (Free Report)
Amazon.com, Inc is a diversified technology and retail company best known for its e-commerce marketplace and broad portfolio of consumer and enterprise services. Founded by Jeff Bezos in 1994 and headquartered in Seattle, Washington, the company launched as an online bookseller and expanded into a global retail platform that sells products directly to consumers and provides a marketplace for third-party sellers. Over time Amazon has grown beyond retail into areas including cloud computing, digital media, devices and logistics.
Key businesses and offerings include Amazon’s online marketplace and fulfillment services, the Amazon Prime membership program (which bundles expedited shipping with streaming and other benefits), Amazon Web Services (AWS) which supplies on-demand cloud computing and storage to businesses and public-sector customers, and a range of content and advertising services such as Prime Video and Amazon Advertising.
Further Reading Five stocks we like better than Amazon.com Confidence Is Back, But Earnings Show the Consumer Is Being Picky AeroVironment’s Stock Is Down, But Drone Demand Is Taking Off 3M’s Redemption Arc: Can Q2 Earnings Change the Narrative? 3 Photonics Companies Making Quantum Tech Possible
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Equitable Trust Co. grew its holdings in shares of Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) by 17.2% during the first quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The firm owned 182,411 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock after purchasing an additional 26,716 shares during the period. Amazon.com accounts for 1.8% of Equitable Trust Co.’s portfolio, making the stock its 11th biggest position. Equitable Trust Co.’s holdings in Amazon.com were worth $37,991,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.
Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of the business. MilWealth Group LLC grew its holdings in shares of Amazon.com by 79.0% during the fourth quarter. MilWealth Group LLC now owns 179 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock valued at $41,000 after purchasing an additional 79 shares during the last quarter. Lifetime Wealth Management P.C. acquired a new stake in shares of Amazon.com during the 4th quarter worth approximately $45,000. Elkhorn Partners Limited Partnership lifted its holdings in shares of Amazon.com by 900.0% in the 4th quarter. Elkhorn Partners Limited Partnership now owns 200 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $46,000 after purchasing an additional 180 shares during the last quarter. Fairway Wealth LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Amazon.com by 95.6% in the 4th quarter. Fairway Wealth LLC now owns 221 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $51,000 after purchasing an additional 108 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Prudent Man Investment Management Inc. boosted its position in Amazon.com by 87.7% during the 4th quarter. Prudent Man Investment Management Inc. now owns 229 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock valued at $53,000 after purchasing an additional 107 shares during the period. 72.20% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.
Amazon.com Stock Performance Shares of AMZN opened at $247.55 on Wednesday. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $250.08 and a 200 day moving average price of $236.20. The firm has a market capitalization of $2.66 trillion, a PE ratio of 29.61, a P/E/G ratio of 1.86 and a beta of 1.46. Amazon.com, Inc. has a 52-week low of $196.00 and a 52-week high of $278.56. The company has a quick ratio of 1.01, a current ratio of 1.18 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27.
Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN – Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, April 29th. The e-commerce giant reported $2.78 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.63 by $1.15. The business had revenue of $181.52 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $177.28 billion. Amazon.com had a net margin of 12.22% and a return on equity of 19.92%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 16.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the business earned $1.59 earnings per share. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that Amazon.com, Inc. will post 7.75 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.
Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth Several equities research analysts have weighed in on AMZN shares. Rosenblatt Securities increased their target price on Amazon.com from $296.00 to $332.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, April 30th. TD Cowen reaffirmed a “buy” rating and issued a $340.00 price objective (down from $350.00) on shares of Amazon.com in a report on Wednesday, July 8th. Stifel Nicolaus set a $319.00 target price on shares of Amazon.com and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 30th. Guggenheim restated a “buy” rating and issued a $320.00 target price (up from $300.00) on shares of Amazon.com in a research report on Thursday, April 30th. Finally, Needham & Company LLC raised their price target on shares of Amazon.com from $265.00 to $300.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 30th. Fifty-seven investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have issued a Hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $312.91.
Check Out Our Latest Report on Amazon.com
Insiders Place Their Bets In other Amazon.com news, VP Shelley Reynolds sold 2,363 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, May 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $262.38, for a total value of $620,003.94. Following the sale, the vice president directly owned 119,780 shares in the company, valued at approximately $31,427,876.40. The trade was a 1.93% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, SVP David Zapolsky sold 9,270 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, May 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $268.53, for a total transaction of $2,489,273.10. Following the transaction, the senior vice president owned 41,190 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $11,060,750.70. This trade represents a 18.37% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Over the last 90 days, insiders have sold 144,274 shares of company stock valued at $38,716,204. 8.90% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.
Amazon.com News Roundup Here are the key news stories impacting Amazon.com this week:
Positive Sentiment: Amazon Business reached a $60 billion annualized sales run rate, with more than 1.8 million organizations joining in the first half of the year, reinforcing the strength of Amazon’s B2B platform. Amazon Business Hits $60 Billion in Annualized Sales Positive Sentiment: Multiple articles highlighted Amazon as an attractive AI cloud stock, citing AWS growth, a lower valuation than Microsoft, and improving sentiment around Amazon’s AI infrastructure buildout. Amazon vs. Microsoft: Which AI Cloud Titan Is the Better Investment? Positive Sentiment: Analysts and commentators continued to argue that Amazon is undervalued relative to its AI capex plans, with bullish takes focused on AWS, Trainium chips, and the company’s strategic position in artificial intelligence. Is Amazon.com (AMZN) Undervalued Following Its $200b AI Infrastructure Push? Neutral Sentiment: Amazon also got publicity from Jeff Bezos-related and Amazon-marketplace stories, plus a new satellite-business finance hire, but these items are unlikely to move the stock much by themselves. Amazon taps Alexa executive as Leo satellite business’s first finance VP Neutral Sentiment: Bill Ackman reportedly called Amazon a “cheap stock,” adding to the bullish long-term narrative, but this is more sentiment support than a direct catalyst. Bill Ackman Says META and AMZN Are ‘Cheap Stocks’ Despite Their Massive Size Negative Sentiment: A separate report said Amazon may be losing some competitive edge on delivery speed, which could reinforce worries about retail margin pressure and execution. Amazon may be losing its biggest competitive edge Negative Sentiment: Some coverage focused on Amazon’s large AI spending plans and shrinking free cash flow, suggesting investors are still skeptical that the capex will translate into near-term profits. Big Tech Is Minting Mountains of Cash — But Amazon’s Is Vanishing Negative Sentiment: There was also an article warning that Amazon’s cash-flow picture needs watching ahead of earnings, keeping attention on whether the AI and cloud investments are paying off fast enough. Amazon’s (AMZN) AI Strategy Continues to Grow, but Cash Flow Needs Watching About Amazon.com (Free Report)
Amazon.com, Inc is a diversified technology and retail company best known for its e-commerce marketplace and broad portfolio of consumer and enterprise services. Founded by Jeff Bezos in 1994 and headquartered in Seattle, Washington, the company launched as an online bookseller and expanded into a global retail platform that sells products directly to consumers and provides a marketplace for third-party sellers. Over time Amazon has grown beyond retail into areas including cloud computing, digital media, devices and logistics.
Key businesses and offerings include Amazon’s online marketplace and fulfillment services, the Amazon Prime membership program (which bundles expedited shipping with streaming and other benefits), Amazon Web Services (AWS) which supplies on-demand cloud computing and storage to businesses and public-sector customers, and a range of content and advertising services such as Prime Video and Amazon Advertising.
Recommended Stories Five stocks we like better than Amazon.com Confidence Is Back, But Earnings Show the Consumer Is Being Picky AeroVironment’s Stock Is Down, But Drone Demand Is Taking Off 3M’s Redemption Arc: Can Q2 Earnings Change the Narrative? 3 Photonics Companies Making Quantum Tech Possible Want to see what other hedge funds are holding AMZN? Visit HoldingsChannel.com to get the latest 13F filings and insider trades for Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN – Free Report).
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