Amazon posts big rally after earnings and helps lift Shopify, Wayfair and Etsy
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Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) raced higher on early Friday trading after the e-commerce giant's price hike for the Prime service and strong AWS numbers set a positive tone with investors. Profits rose to $14.3B in Q4 from $7.2B a year ago, with an $11.8B pre-tax gain on the AMZN stake in Rivian Automotive being a major factor. Operating income for the quarter also impressed at $3.5B.
On Wall Street, J.P. Morgan lifted its price target on Amazon (AMZN) to $4,500. "Looking into 2022, certain macro pressures will remain & Omicron will create further disruption, but with greater normalization, we believe AMZN can see a path out of certain elevated labor costs," noted analyst Doug Anmuth. "We continue to expect revenue growth to re-accelerate beginning in 2Q as comps ease & Prime 1-day/same-day benefits increase, and we also believe AMZNâs investments will slow following 2 heavy years, creating room for margin expansion," he added.
Barclays also came in with a higher price target on AMZN of $4,400. "We think a number of investor concerns around margins are being put to bed, and the next phase of turning the corner is when [gross merchandise value] starts to accelerate, which should play out mid2Q â hence we think AMZN shares have one of the best set-ups in the market in â22," advised the firm. Elsewhere, UBS hiked its price target on AMZN to $4,625 and Credit Suisse took its PT to $4,100.
The Amazon report has created a positive ripple in the e-commerce retail sector. Shares of Wayfair (NYSE:W) gained 3.43% in premarket trading, Etsy (NASDAQ:ETSY) moved 3.58% higher and Shopify (NYSE:SHOP) jumped 4.17%. Other movers included eBay (NASDAQ:EBAY)
+1.12%, MercadoLibre (NASDAQ:MELI)
+2.03% rise, Fiverr International (NYSE:FVRR)
+2.62%, Coupang (NYSE:CPNG)
+3.05% and Chewy (NYSE:CHWY)
+3.43%.
Amazon rose 11.09% in premarket action to $3,085.00 vs. the 52-week trading range of $2,707.04 to $3,773.08.
See what Amazon exec said during the earnings call or dig further into the Q4 numbers.