Amazon's report
Amazon shares rose after the company reported first-quarter results above analysts' expectations. Amazon's total revenues rose 44 per cent. The company said it will hold its Prime Day sale in June giving it a good head start for the second quarter.
Amazon (AMZN) last week released its first-quarter results digital commerce sales, the cloud division and digital advertising revenue were both strong.
Amazon shares rose, given also the approving valuations of Wall Street analysts, who raised their target prices after the company's report.
Amazon's total revenue for the first three months of 2021 was $108.52bn.
The bulk of Amazon's sales growth came from its international segment, with overseas revenues up 60% and revenues in North America up 40%.
Quarterly earnings rose to $15.79 per share, easily beating expectations of $9.54 earnings per share.
Revenues at Amazon Web Services, the global leader in cloud computing, rose 32% to $13.5 billion in the first quarter.
Amazon's revenues in the "Other" category, which it said consisted mainly of digital advertising sales, rose 77% from a year earlier to $6.9 billion.
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos highlighted the success of the company's streaming video service Prime Video, which users subscribe to by paying $119 for a Prime Club membership with access to free two-day delivery of online orders. The company now has 200 million Prime subscribers, 50 million more than at the start of 2020.
Amazon's revenue from physical shops, including Whole Foods Market, Amazon Go and others, continued to fall, with sales down 16% to $3.9bn.
Amazon's forecast for the second quarter of 2021
Amazon executives are forecasting current quarter revenues of between $110bn and $116bn, beating Wall Street's forecast of $108.6bn.
The company said Prime Day, the biggest sale on Amazon's website this year, will take place in June.
The company also said that it expects costs related to the COVID-19 pandemic to decline, but at the same time, Amazon's employee costs will rise as it plans to raise salaries this spring.
Last week, Amazon said it would spend more than $1 billion to raise the salaries of more than half a million of its workers in the US.
