Amazon sales top $100bn for third quarter running as profits hit $7.8bn
Amazon’s sales topped $100bn for the third quarter in a row as its profits for the three months surged to $7.8bn.
The Seattle-based tech and online retail giant reported sales of $113bn for the three months between April and June – over $1.4bn a day. The figure was up from $88.9bn in the second quarter of 2020 but slightly lower than Wall Street had expected, and triggered a 5% slide in its share price in after-hours trading.
Amazon was one of the biggest winners of the pandemic as consumers switched more of their shopping online and businesses used its Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud-computing unit to shift business online.
The pace of its outsized gains in retail appear to be slowing as vaccinations spread in the US and physical stores reopen. The company said it expected sales of between $106bn and $112bn for the current quarter.
The figures come amid a bonanza of record-breaking results from Amazon’s tech peers. Apple, Alphabet (Google’s parent), Facebook and Microsoft have all exceeded analysts’ expectations spurred on by outsized gains they made during the pandemic as people shifted more of their home and work life online.
The latest figures covering April to June mark Amazon’s last quarter under Jeff Bezos, the company’s founder. Bezos left the role on 5 July to become executive chairman and appointed Andy Jassy, who headed AWS, to succeed him.
AWS’s revenues for the quarter were $14.8bn, surpassing analysts’ estimates.
Amazon’s growing dominance has drawn international scrutiny from governments and regulators. In the US the Federal Trade Commission has opened a wide-ranging antitrust investigation into its business practices.
“Thank you to all of our passionate, innovative, mission-driven employees around the world for continuing to stay focused on delivering for customers – I am very excited to work with you as we invent and build for the future,” Jassy said in a statement.