Amazon shares closed up more than 6% on Friday after the company reported third-quarter results that beat analysts’ estimates and showed the company’s cost-cutting efforts are taking effect.
Amazon’s third-quarter revenue rose 13% to $143.1 billion. The company’s net income more than tripled to $9.9 billion, or 94 cents per share, from $2.9 billion, or 28 cents per share, a year earlier. Amazon’s profit came in at 94 cents per share, well above Wall Street’s expected 58 cents.
CEO Andy Jassy was on a austerity path last year to counteract high inflation and rising interest rates. Amazon carried out the largest layoffs in its history, cutting 27,000 jobs since last fall. The company has also frozen corporate hiring, and Jassy has sought to reduce expenses in units across the company.
Amazon reported an operating margin of 7.8%, its highest since a record 8.2% in the first quarter of 2021. The company’s operating margin for the third quarter represents a significant increase from the 2% margin reported a year ago.
“We remain bullish on AMZN, supported by continued improvements in the margin profile, with visibility of AWS acceleration and clear LT AI tailwinds impacting the model over time,” analysts at Jefferies said on Friday in a note to investors.
Blair analysts said Amazon “significantly” exceeded expectations for the quarter and saw real improvement in operating profit growth. They added that the company is “taking back control of the generative AI narrative” and that they see positive signs for AWS’ growth rate.
“We believe stocks offer defensive positioning in a deteriorating market at a compelling value given the longer-term growth and earnings power of the model, with options still embedded in the form of food, healthcare and satellite technology,” wrote them on Friday.
At Goldman Sachs, analysts said that while there were still some questions about AWS’ revival and the nature of the global consumer, they considered the company’s third-quarter report to be “a blow across the board.”
They added that Amazon’s risk-reward ratio remains “strongly skewed in a positive direction.”
“Looking at a multi-year time frame, we reiterate our view that Amazon will deliver a mix of solid revenue performance and increasing margins as the company delivers returns/returns over multi-year investment cycles,” they wrote in a note Friday.
— CNBC’s Michael Bloom and Annie Palmer contributed to this report.
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