Amazon (AMZN.US) Q1 net profit surged to US$10.4 billion, rising more than 5% after the closing bell
Zhitong Finance APP learned that after the U.S. stock market closed on Tuesday, Amazon (AMZN.US) announced its first quarter financial report for 2024. The company’s revenue and profits both achieved significant growth, but for the following second quarter, its revenue and operations will profit expectations were slightly lower than market expectations. After the financial report was released, the stock price rose by more than 5% after hours.
The financial report showed that Amazon’s first-quarter revenue reached US$143.31 billion, a year-on-year increase of 12.5%, exceeding analysts’ expectations of US$142.6 billion, marking the fastest growth in a year. Net profit increased by an astonishing 225% year-on-year to US$10.431 billion, higher than the expected US$8.9 billion. In addition, adjusted earnings per share (EPS) came to $0.98, well above expectations of $0.83 and $0.31 in the same period last year.
The company’s AWS (Amazon Cloud Services) business accelerated growth for the second consecutive quarter, with revenue reaching $25 billion, a year-on-year increase of nearly 17%, exceeding market expectations of $24.5 billion. The business‘s operating margin also hit a record high of 37.6%, reflecting the company’s increasing competitiveness in cloud computing.
In addition, the advertising business also showed strong growth momentum. Advertising revenue in the first quarter increased from US$9.5 billion in the same period last year to US$11.8 billion, an increase of 24%. Growth in this business contributes a significant portion of Amazon’s overall profits.
Amazon expects second-quarter revenue to be between US$144 billion and US$149 billion, a year-on-year increase of 7% to 11%, lower than market expectations of US$150 billion. Operating profit is expected to be between US$10 billion and US$14 billion, a significant increase from US$7.7 billion in the same period last year, but the midpoint of the range is still below market expectations of US$12.56 billion.
Despite its overall positive financial results, Amazon has not announced a dividend, following in the footsteps of Meta (META) and Google (GOOG, GOOGL), making it the last of the big tech companies that has yet to pay a dividend to shareholders.
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said in the financial report that the company’s various business units are in the early stages of development, especially AWS and the advertising business. He believes that these businesses are expected to continue to grow as corporate investment in infrastructure resumes and AWS’s appeal in the field of artificial intelligence increases.