The company forecasts an operating income to be between $300 million and $1 billion compared to $1 billion in the first quarter of 2017.
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Profits got a welcome boost from a $789m tax benefit thanks to new legislation passed in the USA in December, as well as cloud services arm Amazon Web Services (AWS), new Prime members and voice-activated device sales. “That is going to increase the amortization”, he said. On Thursday, the marketplace recorded a profit of $1.9 billion on $5.1 billion in revenue in the final quarter of 2017, marking the eleventh straight quarter of positive net income.
“This was probably one of the cleanest quarters”, Olsavsky said.
Daniel Salmon, an analyst at BMO Capital Markets, also was cautious on Google’s outlook in a report. He said Amazon had a “monster Black Friday and Cyber Monday”. Its revenue rose 45% to $5.1 billion.
Amazon will report its fourth-quarter results on Thursday after the market closes.
Brands announced new AVS products at the 2018 Consumer Electronics Show, including: new integrations for Alexa on PCs from HP, Acer, ASUS, and Lenovo; a new automotive integration with Toyota; and new devices from Polk Audio, Anker, Jabra, and more.
So if Amazon is renewing its push with Alexa, you can expect more devices powered by the voice assistant, more Alexa skills and features, and likely more Alexa-compatible home appliances. Founder and CEO Jeff Bezos introduces product after product to drive new sales and customer loyalty. “We feel that it’s had a lot of growth in the past year”, Olsavsky said during an earnings call with investors. Alexa usage on Fire TV, for example, was “up 9x year-over-year” in Q4, he told analysts.
Amazon already made a big push with Alexa a year ago, most notably by updating its lineup of Echo smart speakers, which are powered by Alexa, and releasing several new models, including the touchscreen-enabled Echo Show, the Echo Spot alarm clock, and the Echo Plus smart-home hub. India is also the fastest-growing market for the company’s Prime subscription service in terms of memberships, a point the Seattle-based e-commerce giant reiterated in its latest post-earnings conference call with analysts. $789 Million boosts was also received as a profit as a result of the U.S. Republican tax bill passed in December. In comparison, streaming rival Netflix ended 2017 with aboout 118 million subscribers globally, including about 111 million paid subscribers, he said. Last year, Amazon launched Prime in the Netherlands, Luxembourg, and Singapore.
Amazon Web Services had a strong quarter ($5.1 billion), but of particular interest is Amazon’s advertising business, which it now lumps into the category “other”. Earnings-per-share were at $3.75 with the tax cut and $2.15 without, compared to expectations of just $1.83.
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Shares rose 5.7% in early trading February 2 to $1,468.50.
