Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) Stock Price Up 2.9% – Still a Buy?

Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) shares rose 2.9% on Monday. The stock traded as high as $275.34 and last traded at $266.93. 50,510,704 shares traded hands during mid-day trading, an increase of 8% from the average session volume of 46,787,617 shares. The stock had previously closed at $259.30.

Key Stories Impacting Amazon.com

These are some of the AMZN stories that stood out recently:

• Positive Sentiment: AWS demand and Anthropic exposure support the growth case. AWS grew nearly 39% year over year, with a reported $578 billion backlog. Amazon could also benefit from its Anthropic stake, estimated at about $272 billion at the top of the proposed IPO price range, as well as cloud-computing and marketplace revenue tied to Anthropic. The stake’s value is prospective and depends on the IPO valuation. Article: Anthropic’s Trillion-Dollar IPO Could Give Cloud Giants a Double Win
• Positive Sentiment: AI inference could be a long-term opportunity. AWS CEO Matt Garman said AI inference demand is still at an early stage, while Amazon’s custom-chip business and data-center expansion position AWS to serve future workloads. Article: AWS CEO Matt Garman on AI inference
• Neutral Sentiment: Amazon received a modest ratings improvement. InvestorPlace’s Stock Grader raised AMZN from Weak to Neutral, citing return on equity and analyst revisions as strengths, while still flagging weak free cash flow and earnings momentum. Article: Stock Grader Upgrades and Downgrades

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities analysts have commented on the stock. Scotiabank lowered their price objective on shares of Amazon.com from $325.00 to $300.00 and set a “sector outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, October 30th. Needham & Company LLC restated a “buy” rating and issued a $300.00 target price on shares of Amazon.com in a report on Friday, July 31st. UBS Group restated a “buy” rating and set a $348.00 target price (up from $318.00) on shares of Amazon.com in a research report on Monday, October 26th. Cantor Fitzgerald dropped their price target on Amazon.com from $310.00 to $280.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, October 30th. Finally, Raymond James Financial reissued an “outperform” rating and set a $250.00 price objective on shares of Amazon.com in a research note on Friday, October 30th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, fifty-five have assigned a Buy rating and three have assigned a Hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $321.74.

Amazon.com Trading Down 1.7%

The firm has a market cap of $2.88 trillion, a PE ratio of 21.52, a P/E/G ratio of 2.03 and a beta of 1.49. The company has a quick ratio of 0.82, a current ratio of 0.99 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.28. The company’s 50 day moving average price is $254.19 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $243.93.

Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, October 29th. The e-commerce giant reported $1.89 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.97 by ($0.08). The firm had revenue of $201.94 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $202.22 billion. Amazon.com had a return on equity of 15.72% and a net margin of 16.90%. Amazon.com’s revenue for the quarter was up 12.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $1.95 earnings per share. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that Amazon.com, Inc. will post 7.80 EPS for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Amazon.com

In other news, SVP David Zapolsky sold 9,258 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, August 24th. The stock was sold at an average price of $259.77, for a total value of $2,404,950.66. Following the sale, the senior vice president directly owned 41,190 shares in the company, valued at approximately $10,699,926.30. This represents a 18.35% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, CEO Andrew R. Jassy sold 20,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, August 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $259.01, for a total value of $5,180,200.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer directly owned 2,235,766 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $579,085,751.66. This represents a 0.89% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Over the last ninety days, insiders have sold 71,589 shares of company stock valued at $18,545,595. 8.90% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Trading of Amazon.com

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of AMZN. State Street Corp raised its stake in shares of Amazon.com by 5.5% during the second quarter. State Street Corp now owns 411,848,346 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock valued at $95,504,904,000 after acquiring an additional 21,398,025 shares in the last quarter. Bank of America Corp DE bought a new position in Amazon.com in the second quarter worth approximately $22,218,775,000. Bank of New York Mellon Corp purchased a new position in Amazon.com during the 2nd quarter worth $16,341,405,000. Amundi increased its holdings in Amazon.com by 3.9% during the 2nd quarter. Amundi now owns 63,822,242 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $15,211,393,000 after purchasing an additional 2,421,739 shares during the period. Finally, Legal & General Group Plc purchased a new position in Amazon.com during the 2nd quarter worth $12,831,376,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 72.20% of the company’s stock.

Amazon.com Company Profile

Amazon.com, Inc. is a technology and e-commerce company founded by Jeff Bezos in 1994 as an online bookstore. It has since grown into a global business serving consumers, sellers, developers, enterprises and content creators. Amazon operates online stores and marketplaces, where it sells products directly and enables third-party sellers to reach customers. Its other businesses include Amazon Web Services, which provides cloud computing and related services; digital advertising; Prime memberships; and entertainment offerings such as streaming video and music.