Amazon has, once again, surprised many by posting a quarterly profit for the second time in a row, bagging $25.4bn in net sales, almost $5bn up on this time last year.
Amazon is the internet’s poster child, a company whose timeline best represents the shift towards online. As tangible stores faltered, a rainforest of digital business emerged.
However, life hasn’t always been easy for the company. There have been some costly problems, some wonderful headlines, and disputes abound. But now, it seems, everything is back on an upwards curve.
Net income was $79m in Q3 compared with net loss of $437m this time last year.
North American sales helped Amazon stay in profit, with cloud computing playing a key role too. The latter service, actually, saw net sales leap almost 80pc in the quarter to $2.09bn.
Interestingly, Prime Day, a one-day member-only sales event ridiculed on social media during the summer, is noted as a decent success, with Amazon shifting 34.4m items in just 24 hours.
Indeed, Amazon’s Prime offering was something specifically namechecked by CFO Brian Olsavsky upon posting the results.
“Globally we are investing very heavily in our Prime platform,” he said, noting the release of a swathe of devices like low-cost e-readers and tablets.
“So there’s a lot of investment going on, and there will continue to be, especially related to Prime. Innovation and investment will continue and can be lumpy over time.”
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