Amazon.com (AMZN) late Thursday reported stronger-than-expected fourth-quarter results, buoyed by a record holiday shopping season, while the e-commerce giant’s cloud computing revenue grew by a double-digit percentage.
Per-share earnings jumped to $1 for the quarter through Dec. 31 from $0.03 a year earlier, topping the Capital IQ-polled GAAP EPS forecast of $0.80. Sales increased 14% to $169.96 billion, higher than Wall Street’s $166.26 billion view.
The stock was up 8% in after-hours trading activity.
“This (fourth quarter) was a record-breaking holiday shopping season and closed out a robust 2023 for Amazon,” Chief Executive Andy Jassy said in a statement. “The regionalization of our US fulfillment network led to our fastest-ever delivery speeds for Prime members while also lowering our cost to serve.”
Customers purchased more than 1 billion items on Amazon across the world from Nov. 17 through Nov. 27, according to the company. In the US, customers ordered more than 500 million items from independent sellers.
Sales at its cloud-computing platform Amazon Web Service rose 13% annually to $24.2 billion, while the segment’s operating income increased to $7.17 billion from $5.21 billion. Overall North American sales climbed 13% year over year to $105.51 billion, while international revenue gained 17% to $40.24 billion.
Amazon said it recorded a pretax valuation loss of $100 million on its investment in Rivian Automotive (RIVN), compared with a $2.3 billion loss a year earlier. Consolidated operating income surged to $13.21 billion in the fourth quarter from $2.74 billion a year earlier.
The company expects first-quarter sales of $138 billion and $143.5 billion, which would reflect annual growth between 8% and 13%. Analysts polled by Capital IQ are looking for $142.17 billion.
Amazon projected operating income between $8 billion and $12 billion, compared with $4.8 billion in the 2023 first quarter.