Amazon Delivers Mxed Bag Of 2Q Results, Shares Slide

NEW YORK (AP) — Amazon on Thursday turned in a mixed bag of results for its fiscal second quarter, coming up short of Wall Street expectations in revenue but beating on profits.

During the three-month period ended June 30, the Seattle-based company reported profit of $7.78 billion, or $15.12 per share compared to $5.24 billion, or $10.30 a share, during the year-ago period. Revenue jumped 27% to $113.08 billion.

Analysts surveyed by FactSet on average expected $115.42 billion in quarterly revenue and per-share earnings of $12.28.

Shares in Amazon.com Inc. fell more than 6% in after-market trading.

Amazon is one of the few retailers that has prospered during the pandemic. As physical stores that sold non-essential goods like clothing temporarily closed, people stuck at home turned to Amazon to buy groceries, cleaning supplies and more. But the latest quarter shows that Amazon’s top line was a bit challenged.

Besides online shopping, Amazon’s other businesses expanded, too. Sales at its cloud-computing business, which helps power the online operations of Netflix, McDonald’s and other companies, grew 37% in the quarter. And at its unit that includes its advertising business, where brands pay to get their products to show up first when shoppers search on the site, sales rose 87%.

It was the company’s last quarter with founder Jeff Bezos as CEO. He stepped down to become executive chairman in early July. Andrew Jassy, who headed its cloud-computing unit, Amazon Web Services, succeeded him.

Amazon’s growth comes as it faces activism from within its workforce. Workers at a warehouse in Alabama tried to unionize, saying they wanted better pay and more break time. But a majority of voters batted down that effort.