Exane Asset Management Buys New Stake in Amazon.com, Inc. $AMZN

Key Points

• Exane Asset Management opened a new position in Amazon during the fourth quarter, buying 76,192 shares valued at about $17.6 million. Amazon now represents roughly 4% of the firm’s portfolio and is its 7th-largest holding.
• Amazon’s latest quarterly results topped expectations, with EPS of $2.78 and revenue of $181.52 billion, both above analyst estimates. Revenue rose 16.6% year over year, and the company also highlighted continued strength in AWS and AI-related demand.
• Wall Street remains broadly upbeat on AMZN, with multiple analysts raising price targets and a consensus target of $313.09. The stock has also attracted heavy institutional ownership, with hedge funds and other institutions holding about 72.2% of shares outstanding.

Exane Asset Management purchased a new stake in shares of Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor purchased 76,192 shares of the e-commerce giant's stock, valued at approximately $17,587,000. Amazon.com makes up about 4.0% of Exane Asset Management's investment portfolio, making the stock its 7th biggest position.

Other hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its position in Amazon.com by 1.1% in the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 832,274,556 shares of the e-commerce giant's stock worth $158,348,557,000 after purchasing an additional 8,913,959 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp lifted its holdings in Amazon.com by 2.0% in the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 381,681,441 shares of the e-commerce giant's stock valued at $83,805,794,000 after purchasing an additional 7,584,156 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its stake in shares of Amazon.com by 1.7% in the 2nd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 216,717,657 shares of the e-commerce giant's stock worth $47,332,625,000 after acquiring an additional 3,721,658 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in shares of Amazon.com in the 2nd quarter worth $27,438,011,000. Finally, Northern Trust Corp increased its stake in shares of Amazon.com by 0.3% in the 1st quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 97,379,134 shares of the e-commerce giant's stock worth $18,527,354,000 after acquiring an additional 302,858 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 72.20% of the company's stock.

More Amazon.com News

Here are the key news stories impacting Amazon.com this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Amazon’s latest earnings beat showed stronger-than-expected revenue and profits, while AWS growth and AI-related demand continue to support the long-term growth narrative. Amazon Over Spending on AI?
• Positive Sentiment: Amazon is opening its logistics network to outside customers through Amazon Supply Chain Services, creating a new revenue stream beyond retail and cloud. Amazon Bets Logistics Is the New Cloud
• Positive Sentiment: Amazon Pharmacy is expanding access to Novo Nordisk’s Ozempic pill through same-day delivery and kiosks, adding another growth angle in healthcare. Amazon to Carry Ozempic
• Positive Sentiment: Several analysts have raised price targets after the Q1 report, reflecting confidence that Amazon can keep compounding growth. Analyst Target Raises
• Neutral Sentiment: CEO Andy Jassy sold shares under a pre-arranged trading plan, which is notable but does not necessarily signal a change in fundamentals. Jassy Share Sale
• Neutral Sentiment: Some articles highlighted concerns about Amazon’s heavy AI and data-center spending, but investors appear willing to give the company time to convert that investment into future growth. Cash Burn Concern
• Negative Sentiment: An AWS cooling issue caused a brief outage that disrupted services at other platforms, reminding investors that cloud reliability remains a key risk for Amazon Web Services. AWS Outage

Amazon.com Stock Performance

Amazon.com stock opened at $272.62 on Friday. The stock's 50-day moving average is $227.55 and its 200-day moving average is $228.72. The company has a market cap of $2.93 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 32.61, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.96 and a beta of 1.46. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27, a current ratio of 1.18 and a quick ratio of 1.01. Amazon.com, Inc. has a 12 month low of $191.16 and a 12 month high of $278.56.

Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, April 29th. The e-commerce giant reported $2.78 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of $1.63 by $1.15. Amazon.com had a return on equity of 19.92% and a net margin of 12.22%.The firm had revenue of $181.52 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $177.28 billion. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $1.59 EPS. Amazon.com's quarterly revenue was up 16.6% on a year-over-year basis. Equities analysts anticipate that Amazon.com, Inc. will post 7.98 earnings per share for the current year.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

AMZN has been the subject of a number of research analyst reports. Guggenheim restated a "buy" rating and set a $320.00 target price (up from $300.00) on shares of Amazon.com in a report on Thursday, April 30th. Telsey Advisory Group boosted their price objective on Amazon.com from $300.00 to $315.00 and gave the stock an "outperform" rating in a research report on Thursday, April 30th. Piper Sandler reissued an "overweight" rating and set a $315.00 price objective (up from $260.00) on shares of Amazon.com in a research report on Thursday, April 30th. Susquehanna restated a "positive" rating and set a $325.00 target price (up from $300.00) on shares of Amazon.com in a research note on Thursday, April 30th. Finally, Wall Street Zen cut Amazon.com from a "buy" rating to a "hold" rating in a research note on Saturday, January 10th. Fifty-six investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have issued a Hold rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus price target of $313.09.

Insider Transactions at Amazon.com

In other Amazon.com news, CEO Douglas J. Herrington sold 27,500 shares of the business's stock in a transaction dated Monday, May 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $275.00, for a total value of $7,562,500.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 471,361 shares in the company, valued at $129,624,275. The trade was a 5.51% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, SVP David Zapolsky sold 10,649 shares of the company's stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 24th. The shares were sold at an average price of $205.43, for a total value of $2,187,624.07. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president owned 41,190 shares in the company, valued at approximately $8,461,661.70. This represents a 20.54% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders sold a total of 191,593 shares of company stock worth $46,289,241 over the last 90 days. 8.90% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Amazon.com Profile

Amazon.com, Inc is a diversified technology and retail company best known for its e-commerce marketplace and broad portfolio of consumer and enterprise services. Founded by Jeff Bezos in 1994 and headquartered in Seattle, Washington, the company launched as an online bookseller and expanded into a global retail platform that sells products directly to consumers and provides a marketplace for third-party sellers. Over time Amazon has grown beyond retail into areas including cloud computing, digital media, devices and logistics.

Key businesses and offerings include Amazon's online marketplace and fulfillment services, the Amazon Prime membership program (which bundles expedited shipping with streaming and other benefits), Amazon Web Services (AWS) which supplies on-demand cloud computing and storage to businesses and public-sector customers, and a range of content and advertising services such as Prime Video and Amazon Advertising.

Want to see what other hedge funds are holding AMZN? Visit HoldingsChannel.com to get the latest 13F filings and insider trades for Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN - Free Report).

This instant news alert was generated by narrative science technology and financial data from MarketBeat in order to provide readers with the fastest reporting and unbiased coverage. Please send any questions or comments about this story to contact@marketbeat.com.