Shares of e-commerce giant Amazon (AMZN) jumped in after-hours trading after the firm reported solid Q3 results. Earnings per share came in at $1.43, which beat analysts’ consensus estimate of $1.14 per share. Sales increased by 11% year-over-year, with revenue hitting $158.88 billion. This also beat analysts’ expectations of $157.28 billion.
The various segments of the company witnessed notable growth over the past year. North America’s sales climbed to $95.5 billion, which was a 9% increase from the previous year. In the International segment, sales reached $35.9 billion, a year-over-year growth of 12%. Additionally, the AWS segment experienced a 19% increase in sales, which equaled a total of $27.5 billion.
Guidance for Q4 2024:
Looking forward, management released the following guidance for Q4 2024:
- Revenue in the range of $181.5 billion to $188.5 billion compared to analysts’ forecast of $186.3 billion
- Operating income between $16 billion to $20 billion versus expectations of $17.3 billion
This guidance is considered mixed due to a revenue midpoint of $185 billion that missed estimates and an operating income midpoint of $18 billion that beat. Nevertheless, it seems investors were happy enough with the earnings and operating income forecast beats to send shares higher.
Investor Sentiment for AMZN Stock
Although recent sentiment in AMZN stock has been Neutral, it appears that investors are still very confident about the company, as demonstrated by the after-hours session. In fact, 15% of the 763,927 portfolios tracked by TipRanks hold AMZN shares with an average weighting of 12.58%. Clearly, their positions are large enough to significantly impact overall performance, which would not be the case if they were worried about the company.
Is Amazon a Buy, Sell, or Hold?
Turning to Wall Street, analysts have a Strong Buy consensus rating on AMZN stock based on 46 Buys and two Holds assigned in the past three months, as indicated by the graphic below. After a 37% rally in its share price over the past year, the average AMZN price target of $224.14 per share implies 19.8% upside potential. However, it’s worth noting that estimates will likely change following today’s earnings report.
