Amazon Beats Wall Street Expectations for First Quarter
After market close yesterday Amazon.com, Inc. announced its financial results for the 2017 first quarter and the numbers were impressive.
Net sales increased 23% to $35.7 billion in the first quarter, compared with $29.1 billion in first quarter 2016.
Amazon’s net income was $724 million in the first quarter, or $1.48 per diluted share, compared with net income of $513 million, or $1.07 per diluted share, in first quarter 2016.
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos chose to call out Amazon’s efforts in India in the quarterly earnings release, where it has made a huge bet on that e-commerce market. Amazon is just behind Flipkart as the top e-commerce site in India and appears set to pass its rival.
“Our India team is moving fast and delivering for customers and sellers. The team has increased Prime selection by 75% since launching the program nine months ago, increased fulfillment capacity for sellers by 26% already this year, announced 18 Indian Original TV series, and just last week introduced a Fire TV Stick optimized for Indian customers with integrated voice search in English and Hindi,” Bezos said.
“We’re grateful that customers are responding — Amazon.in is the most visited and the fastest growing marketplace in India. It’s still Day 1 for e-commerce in India, and I assure you that we’ll keep investing in technology and infrastructure while working hard to invent on behalf of our customers and small and medium businesses in India.”
Amazon’s stock price is up 3% in early morning trading today.