Ballast Rock Private Wealth LLC Makes New $989,000 Investment in Amazon.com, Inc. $AMZN

Ballast Rock Private Wealth LLC purchased a new position in shares of Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor purchased 4,287 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock, valued at approximately $989,000.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the business. Norges Bank purchased a new stake in Amazon.com in the second quarter valued at about $27,438,011,000. Nuveen LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Amazon.com during the first quarter worth about $11,674,091,000. Laurel Wealth Advisors LLC grew its stake in shares of Amazon.com by 22,085.8% during the second quarter. Laurel Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 12,177,557 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $2,671,634,000 after acquiring an additional 12,122,668 shares during the last quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Amazon.com by 21.3% during the first quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 57,908,424 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock valued at $11,017,657,000 after acquiring an additional 10,176,835 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Capital Research Global Investors increased its holdings in shares of Amazon.com by 11.3% during the third quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 94,284,962 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock valued at $20,702,362,000 after acquiring an additional 9,583,217 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 72.20% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Amazon.com news, CEO Matthew S. Garman sold 15,467 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, May 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $263.40, for a total transaction of $4,074,007.80. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 14,159 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,729,480.60. This represents a 52.21% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, CEO Andrew R. Jassy sold 20,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, May 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $263.42, for a total transaction of $5,268,400.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 2,205,766 shares in the company, valued at approximately $581,042,879.72. The trade was a 0.90% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders have sold 194,774 shares of company stock worth $51,348,244 in the last 90 days. 8.90% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of analysts recently commented on the stock. Royal Bank Of Canada set a $320.00 target price on shares of Amazon.com and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 30th. BMO Capital Markets raised their price target on shares of Amazon.com from $310.00 to $315.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, April 23rd. Needham & Company LLC lifted their price objective on shares of Amazon.com from $265.00 to $300.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 30th. China Renaissance upped their target price on Amazon.com from $300.00 to $326.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, May 5th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their target price on Amazon.com from $280.00 to $330.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 30th. Fifty-seven equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have given a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $312.52.

Amazon.com Stock Performance

AMZN opened at $256.52 on Wednesday. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $246.43 and a 200 day moving average price of $232.58. Amazon.com, Inc. has a 1 year low of $196.00 and a 1 year high of $278.56. The stock has a market cap of $2.76 trillion, a P/E ratio of 30.68, a P/E/G ratio of 1.96 and a beta of 1.44. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27, a current ratio of 1.18 and a quick ratio of 1.01.

Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, April 29th. The e-commerce giant reported $2.78 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.63 by $1.15. The company had revenue of $181.52 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $177.28 billion. Amazon.com had a net margin of 12.22% and a return on equity of 19.92%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 16.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $1.59 earnings per share. Equities research analysts anticipate that Amazon.com, Inc. will post 7.71 earnings per share for the current year.

Amazon.com News Summary

Here are the key news stories impacting Amazon.com this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Amazon moved Prime Day to June 23-26 and kept it a four-day event, which could lift near-term e-commerce sales and membership engagement. Reuters Prime Day article
• Positive Sentiment: The event will include new Alexa AI features, reinforcing Amazon’s AI strategy and potentially improving shopping conversion. Forbes article on Alexa AI-powered Prime Day
• Positive Sentiment: Analyst commentary remained constructive, with bullish Wall Street coverage and price-target increases helping support the stock. Zacks analyst article
• Neutral Sentiment: Amazon’s cloud and AI businesses continue to draw attention, including reports that AWS is expanding AI-related investment and that its Anthropic stake has become far more valuable. Business Insider article on Anthropic stake
• Negative Sentiment: Amazon faces fresh regulatory and legal pressure, including an EU cloud procurement review that could make it harder for AWS to win certain government contracts. Reuters EU cloud rules article
• Negative Sentiment: Amazon’s Ring unit was hit with a class-action privacy lawsuit over facial recognition features, adding to ongoing data-privacy scrutiny. Reuters Ring lawsuit article
• Negative Sentiment: Investor sentiment may also be weighed by a report that Stanley Druckenmiller sharply reduced his Amazon position, which can be read as a cautious signal from a high-profile fund manager. Motley Fool Druckenmiller article

Amazon.com Company Profile

Amazon.com, Inc is a diversified technology and retail company best known for its e-commerce marketplace and broad portfolio of consumer and enterprise services. Founded by Jeff Bezos in 1994 and headquartered in Seattle, Washington, the company launched as an online bookseller and expanded into a global retail platform that sells products directly to consumers and provides a marketplace for third-party sellers. Over time Amazon has grown beyond retail into areas including cloud computing, digital media, devices and logistics.

Key businesses and offerings include Amazon’s online marketplace and fulfillment services, the Amazon Prime membership program (which bundles expedited shipping with streaming and other benefits), Amazon Web Services (AWS) which supplies on-demand cloud computing and storage to businesses and public-sector customers, and a range of content and advertising services such as Prime Video and Amazon Advertising.