Publishers Lunch
Amazon's stock is down over 10 percent in
early Friday trading (a decline of almost $40 a share) after reporting a larger
than expected loss for their second quarter -- and forecasting bigger losses
for the next quarter. Second quarter sales grew 23 percent to $19.34
billion, with an operating loss of $15 million, and a net loss of $126
million, or 27 cents a share. Sales were right on target with analysts'
estimates, but the loss was bigger than the consensus guess of 15 cents a
share. That earnings miss plus third quarter guidance of a big operating
loss of anywhere between $410 million and $810 million (compared to a $25
million loss in the same quarter a year ago) has once again spooked investors.
Amazon as a company continues to lose money
for its shareholders, but by all accounts their employees continue to do just
fine with company stock. Stock-based compensation and amortization of
intangible assets accounted for $391 million in the just-reported quarter, and
is expected to comprise $410 in the third quarter.
In Thursday's report, North American
media sales of $2.46 billion were up 13 percent compared to a year ago, and
international media sales of $2.38 billion grew 7 percent. In the investor
conference call, cfo Tom Szkutak said
in answer to a question: "In terms of Kindle Unlimited, it's very early,
but we're extremely pleased with what we see. There's been a great reaction to
it. And we're pleased to offer that to customers."
The Kindle Fire phone officially releases
today.
No comments:
Post a Comment