Amazon.com Announces First Quarter Sales up 17% to $59.7 Billion
SEATTLE–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) today announced financial results for
its first quarter ended March 31, 2019.
Operating cash flow increased 89% to $34.4 billion for the trailing
twelve months, compared with $18.2 billion for the trailing twelve
months ended March 31, 2018. Free cash flow increased to $23.0 billion
for the trailing twelve months, compared with $7.3 billion for the
trailing twelve months ended March 31, 2018. Free cash flow less
principal repayments of finance leases and financing obligations
increased to $15.1 billion for the trailing twelve months, compared with
$1.1 billion for the trailing twelve months ended March 31, 2018. Free
cash flow less equipment finance leases and principal repayments of all
other finance leases and financing obligations increased to an inflow of
$11.8 billion for the trailing twelve months, compared with an outflow
of $3.0 billion for the trailing twelve months ended March 31, 2018.
On January 1, 2019, we adopted accounting guidance amending the
accounting for leases, which did not have a material impact on our first
quarter operating results. Prior period amounts were not retrospectively
adjusted. Under this new guidance, leases we previously referred to as
“capital leases” are now referred to as “finance leases.” Leases we
previously referred to as “finance leases” are now referred to as
“financing obligations.”
Common shares outstanding plus shares underlying stock-based awards
totaled 507 million on March 31, 2019, compared with 504 million one
year ago.
Net sales increased 17% to $59.7 billion in the first quarter, compared
with $51.0 billion in first quarter 2018. Excluding the $1.1 billion
unfavorable impact from year-over-year changes in foreign exchange rates
throughout the quarter, net sales increased 19% compared with first
quarter 2018.
Operating income increased to $4.4 billion in the first quarter,
compared with operating income of $1.9 billion in first quarter 2018.
Net income increased to $3.6 billion in the first quarter, or $7.09 per
diluted share, compared with net income of $1.6 billion, or $3.27 per
diluted share, in first quarter 2018.
“The son of a working single mom, Leo Jean Baptiste grew up speaking
Haitian Creole in a New Jersey home without internet access. He’s also
one of our inaugural group of 100 high school seniors to receive a
$40,000 Amazon Future Engineer scholarship and Amazon internship,” said
Jeff Bezos, Amazon founder and CEO. “He rose to the top of his class and
is set to study computer science at college this fall, with the dream of
getting a job in machine learning. Our passion for invention led us to
create Amazon Future Engineer so we could help young people like Leo
from underrepresented groups and underserved communities across the
country. In addition to 100 college scholarships a year, we’re funding
computer science classes in 1,000 high schools and counting, and
inspiring younger kids to explore coding through coding camps and
after-school programs. We love this program, and we can’t wait to see
what Leo and his fellow future engineers invent.”
Highlights
- Amazon announced Fire TV now has more than 30 million active users.
-
Amazon launched a new version of the best-selling Fire TV ever – Fire
TV Stick with the all-new Alexa Voice Remote, which has a rating of
4.6 stars on Amazon.com and is available in the U.S., Canada, U.K.,
Germany, Japan, and India. -
Alexa now offers more than 90,000 skills in the Alexa Skills Store
from external developers. Amazon introduced health and wellness
capabilities for developers to build skills that let customers track
baby activities such as sleep, diaper changes, and feedings, and
announced a HIPAA-eligible environment for developers with new
healthcare skills from Express Scripts, Cigna, and Boston Children’s
Hospital. -
Amazon now offers Apple Music via Alexa on Fire TV, Echo, and Sonos
devices in the U.S. and U.K. In addition, Amazon announced the Apple
TV app is coming to Fire TV devices. -
Amazon expanded Alexa features internationally: Echo Show launched in
India, France, Italy, and Spain; Echo Input, which allows customers to
add Alexa to an existing speaker, launched in India, Japan, France,
Italy, Spain, and Australia; and Skype calling with Alexa expanded to
Germany, France, Italy, Spain, and Mexico. Additionally, Alexa can now
understand French in Canada, with a new experience built from the
ground up for French Canadian customers. -
Amazon announced plans to bring Alexa to Brazil later this year.
Developers can start building skills using the Brazilian Portuguese
voice model, and commercial manufacturers can request access to the
Alexa Voice Service developer preview to create devices with Alexa
built-in. Bose, Intelbras, and LG, among others, have already
committed to bringing Alexa built-in products to Brazilian customers. -
Alexa Auto launched in new vehicles, including the all-new Audi
e-tron, so customers can ask Alexa to play music, locate points of
interest, control smart home devices, and access thousands of Alexa
skills with just their voice. Additionally, Amazon released new tools
for developers to optimize their skills for Echo Auto, Alexa-enabled
vehicles, and other automotive accessories with Alexa built-in. -
Amazon introduced the all-new Kindle for $89.99, the first Kindle with
a built-in adjustable front light for under $100. The Kindle also
includes an updated design, the latest electronic ink technology for
better contrast, and three months of Kindle Unlimited for free. -
Amazon and Google announced that in the coming months, the two
companies will launch the official YouTube app on Amazon Fire TV
devices and Fire TV Edition smart TVs, as well as the Prime Video app
for streaming to Chromecast and Chromecast built-in devices. Prime
Video will also be broadly available across Android TV device
partners, and the YouTube TV and YouTube Kids apps will also come to
Fire TV later this year. -
MLB.tv launched as a subscription on Prime Video Channels, offering
Prime customers streaming access to regular season out-of-market
baseball games, both live and on-demand. -
Prime Video debuted Original Series Hanna, a part
high-concept thriller, part coming-of-age drama, based on the 2011
film, and announced the series was picked up for season two.
Additionally, the film Guava Island starring Donald Glover and
Rihanna, launched on Prime Video after a surprise premiere at
Coachella. -
Amazon Studios greenlit more than 20 new and returning local Prime
Original Series, including La Templanza in Spain, Wir
Kinder vom Bahnhof Zoo in Germany, Bandish Bandits in
India, El Presidente in Mexico, and The
Bachelorette in Japan. -
Amazon and Whole Foods Market announced a third round of price cuts,
offering new lower prices on fresh produce for all customers and
expanded Prime benefits with more exclusive weekly deals on popular
products across departments. -
Customer demand for free, two-hour delivery from Whole Foods Market
via Prime Now continues to exceed expectations. To meet this demand,
Amazon and Whole Foods Market continue to grow the service in existing
metros to serve even more customers and expand coverage to new metros,
including the most recent delivery expansion to nine additional U.S.
metros. Currently, delivery from Whole Foods Market via Prime Now is
available in 75 U.S. metros, and grocery pickup from Whole Foods
Market via Prime Now is available in 30 metros, with plans for
continued expansion this year. -
Amazon Day, a new delivery innovation that gives Prime members the
option to choose a day of the week for their packages to arrive,
became available to all U.S. Prime and Business Prime members.
Millions of Prime members are now using Amazon Day, making it easy for
customers to group and receive purchases, and, in many cases, in fewer
boxes. Members can still choose from Prime’s fast, free shipping
options for any item they don’t want to include as part of their
Amazon Day shipment. -
Key by Amazon is now available to millions more Prime members in 50
U.S. cities and surrounding areas. Additionally, Prime members can
choose Key for Garage for secure delivery of Amazon packages, as well
as to Key for Home and Key for Car. -
Customers in the U.S. can now use their Flexible Spending Account and
Health Savings Account debit cards towards eligible purchases on
Amazon, eliminating the need to pay out-of-pocket or submit receipts
for reimbursement. -
Amazon now accepts New York-issued Supplemental Nutrition Assistance
Program (SNAP) EBT cards as part of an online pilot launched in
collaboration with the United States Department of Agriculture.
Millions of beneficiaries can now use their nutrition assistance
benefits to order groceries online and have them delivered directly to
their door, including through free access to Prime Pantry and Amazon
Fresh. -
Amazon announced its new Selling Partner Summits in the U.S., a series
of six conferences for small and medium-sized business (SMBs) to help
build their business in Amazon’s stores. Each Summit will feature an
Amazon-led educational track, experts lounge, and product labs. -
Amazon launched more than 50 new and enhanced tools designed for SMBs
to help build their business in Amazon’s stores. Amazon invests
billions of dollars each year on infrastructure, tools, and services
that enable SMBs to reach new customers and successfully sell their
products online. -
Amazon announced Shipment Zero, the company’s vision to make all
customer shipments net zero carbon, with the goal of making 50% of all
shipments net zero by 2030. To track this progress, Amazon will share
its company-wide carbon footprint as well as related goals and
programs later this year. -
As part of its long-term goal to power all Amazon Web Services (AWS)
global infrastructure with renewable energy, Amazon announced three
new renewable energy projects. These projects – in Ireland, Sweden,
and the U.S. – are expected to generate over 670,000 megawatt hours of
renewable energy annually. The new projects are part of Amazon’s
long-term commitment to achieve 100% renewable energy powering the AWS
global infrastructure. -
Amazon announced the first-ever recipients of the Amazon Future
Engineer (AFE) scholarship. AFE is a childhood-to-career program that
works to inspire and educate millions of children and young adults
each year from underrepresented and underserved communities to pursue
careers in the fast-growing field of computer science and coding. The
100 student recipients were each awarded a $40,000 scholarship to
study computer science at a college of their choice, as well as a
guaranteed paid internship offer at Amazon after their freshmen year
of college. -
Amazon Future Engineer announced robotics grants to 100 schools
serving students from underrepresented and underserved
communities. The schools will receive FIRST Robotics memberships,
giving each school the opportunity to start their first robotics club,
$10,000 from Amazon to expand access to computer science education in
their school, and a tour of a local Amazon Robotics fulfillment center. -
Amazon announced a collaboration with the National Science Foundation
to commit up to $10 million in research grants per year over the next
three years focused on fairness in Artificial Intelligence (AI), with
the goal of contributing to trustworthy AI systems that are readily
accepted and deployed to tackle challenges facing society. -
Amazon was recognized by LinkedIn as one of the most desirable
companies to work for in the U.S., U.K., Australia, India, Japan,
China, Canada, Germany, and Mexico. -
AWS announced several new customer commitments and major migrations
during the quarter: Gogo, Inc. and Lyft are going all-in on AWS;
Second Spectrum and the L.A. Clippers named AWS their official cloud
and machine learning provider; Standard Bank Group and Vertafore
selected AWS as their preferred cloud provider; the Guinness Six
Nations Championship named AWS as their official technology provider;
Volkswagen is joining forces with AWS to transform automotive
manufacturing, powering the Volkswagen Industrial Cloud, and
integrating more than 30,000 facilities and 1,500 suppliers and
partners in Volkswagen’s global supply chain over time; and Ford and
Autonomic, creators of the Transportation Mobility Cloud (TMC),
selected AWS to power TMC and become the standard connected car
solution for Ford vehicles, giving automotive manufacturers and
software developers the cloud infrastructure needed to build
innovative connected vehicle services at scale. -
AWS continued to expand its infrastructure to best serve
customers, launching the AWS Asia Pacific (Hong Kong) Region, and
announcing plans for the AWS Asia Pacific (Jakarta) Region. AWS now
provides 64 Availability Zones across 21 infrastructure regions
globally, with announced plans for another 12 Availability Zones and
four regions in Bahrain, Indonesia, Italy, and South Africa. -
AWS announced the general availability of Amazon S3 Glacier Deep
Archive, a new storage class that provides secure, durable object
storage for long-term retention of data that is rarely accessed. At
just $0.00099 per GB-month (less than one-tenth of one cent, or $1 per
TB-month), S3 Glacier Deep Archive offers the lowest cost storage in
the cloud, at prices significantly lower than storing and maintaining
data in on-premises magnetic tape libraries or archiving data
off-site. In its first week of availability, Deep Archive grew three
times faster than any other storage class in the 13 years since S3
launched. Now with six different storage class options, Amazon S3
provides the broadest array of cost-optimization options available in
the cloud today. -
AWS announced the general availability of Concurrency Scaling for
Amazon Redshift, a new Amazon Redshift feature that automatically adds
and removes capacity to handle unpredictable demand from thousands of
concurrent users. With more than 200 new features and enhancements in
the last two years, Amazon Redshift is delivering an average of 10x
faster query times. Pfizer, McDonald’s, Hilton Hotels Worldwide, Yelp,
Intuit, Redfin, FOX Corporation, NTT DOCOMO, Equinox Fitness, and
Edmunds are among the more than 10,000 customers collectively
processing more than two exabytes with Amazon Redshift every day. -
AWS announced the general availability of Amazon EFS Infrequent Access
(IA), a new storage class for Amazon EFS that is designed for files
accessed less frequently, enabling customers to reduce storage costs
by up to 85% compared to the Amazon EFS Standard storage class. With
EFS IA, Amazon EFS customers simply enable Lifecycle Management, and
any file not accessed after 30 days gets automatically moved to the
EFS IA storage class. -
AWS announced Open Distro for Elasticsearch, a 100% open source
distribution of the Elasticsearch analytics engine that includes
features like security, alerting, cluster diagnostics, and SQL
support. With all of the features of Open Distro for Elasticsearch
licensed under Apache 2.0, developers can use it without any
commercial use restrictions, providing customers a fully-featured,
completely open source distribution that makes it easy for everyone to
use, collaborate, and contribute. -
AWS announced the general availability of Amazon WorkLink, a
fully-managed service that enables companies to provide their
workforce with secure one-click access to internal websites and web
applications from their mobile devices without connecting to VPNs or
using custom browsers. Amazon WorkLink removes the need to build and
maintain complicated infrastructure and software deployments to secure
mobile access to internal content while also reducing the risk of
information loss or theft because content is never stored or cached on
devices.
Financial Guidance
The following forward-looking statements reflect Amazon.com’s
expectations as of April 25, 2019, and are subject to substantial
uncertainty. Our results are inherently unpredictable and may be
materially affected by many factors, such as fluctuations in foreign
exchange rates, changes in global economic conditions and customer
spending, world events, the rate of growth of the Internet, online
commerce, and cloud services, and the various factors detailed below.
Second Quarter 2019 Guidance
-
Net sales are expected to be between $59.5 billion and $63.5 billion,
or to grow between 13% and 20% compared with second quarter 2018. This
guidance anticipates an unfavorable impact of approximately 150 basis
points from foreign exchange rates. -
Operating income is expected to be between $2.6 billion and $3.6
billion, compared with $3.0 billion in second quarter 2018. -
This guidance assumes, among other things, that no additional business
acquisitions, investments, restructurings, or legal settlements are
concluded.
A conference call will be webcast live today at 2:30 p.m. PT/5:30 p.m.
ET, and will be available for at least three months at amazon.com/ir.
This call will contain forward-looking statements and other material
information regarding the Company’s financial and operating results.
These forward-looking statements are inherently difficult to predict.
Actual results could differ materially for a variety of reasons,
including, in addition to the factors discussed above, the amount that
Amazon.com invests in new business opportunities and the timing of those
investments, the mix of products and services sold to customers, the mix
of net sales derived from products as compared with services, the extent
to which we owe income or other taxes, competition, management of
growth, potential fluctuations in operating results, international
growth and expansion, the outcomes of legal proceedings and claims,
fulfillment, sortation, delivery, and data center optimization, risks of
inventory management, seasonality, the degree to which the Company
enters into, maintains, and develops commercial agreements, proposed and
completed acquisitions and strategic transactions, payments risks, and
risks of fulfillment throughput and productivity. Other risks and
uncertainties include, among others, risks related to new products,
services, and technologies, system interruptions, government regulation
and taxation, and fraud. In addition, the current global economic
climate amplifies many of these risks. More information about factors
that potentially could affect Amazon.com’s financial results is included
in Amazon.com’s filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission
(“SEC”), including its most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K and
subsequent filings.
Our investor relations website is amazon.com/ir and we encourage
investors to use it as a way of easily finding information about us. We
promptly make available on this website, free of charge, the reports
that we file or furnish with the SEC, corporate governance information
(including our Code of Business Conduct and Ethics), and select press
releases, which may contain material information about us, and you may
subscribe to be notified of new information posted to this site.
About Amazon
Amazon is guided by four principles: customer obsession rather than
competitor focus, passion for invention, commitment to operational
excellence, and long-term thinking. Customer reviews, 1-Click shopping,
personalized recommendations, Prime, Fulfillment by Amazon, AWS, Kindle
Direct Publishing, Kindle, Fire tablets, Fire TV, Amazon Echo, and Alexa
are some of the products and services pioneered by Amazon. For more
information, visit amazon.com/about and follow @AmazonNews.
AMAZON.COM, INC. | ||||||||||||||||
Consolidated Statements of Cash Flows | ||||||||||||||||
(in millions) | ||||||||||||||||
(unaudited) | ||||||||||||||||
|
Three Months Ended March 31, |
Twelve Months Ended March 31, |
||||||||||||||
2018 | 2019 | 2018 | 2019 | |||||||||||||
CASH, CASH EQUIVALENTS, AND RESTRICTED CASH, BEGINNING OF PERIOD | $ | 21,856 | $ | 32,173 | $ | 16,301 | $ | 17,616 | ||||||||
OPERATING ACTIVITIES: | ||||||||||||||||
Net income | 1,629 | 3,561 | 3,938 | 12,005 | ||||||||||||
Adjustments to reconcile net income to net cash from operating activities: |
||||||||||||||||
Depreciation and amortization of property and equipment and capitalized content costs, operating lease assets, and other |
3,671 | 4,854 | 12,714 | 16,524 | ||||||||||||
Stock-based compensation | 1,182 | 1,274 | 4,605 | 5,509 | ||||||||||||
Other operating expense (income), net | 56 | (13 | ) | 216 | 205 | |||||||||||
Other expense (income), net | (184 | ) | (135 | ) | (437 | ) | 268 | |||||||||
Deferred income taxes | 141 | 415 | 134 | 714 | ||||||||||||
Changes in operating assets and liabilities: | ||||||||||||||||
Inventories | 2,220 | 719 | (2,309 | ) | (2,815 | ) | ||||||||||
Accounts receivable, net and other | 1,029 | (401 | ) | (4,716 | ) | (6,043 | ) | |||||||||
Accounts payable | (10,216 | ) | (6,384 | ) | 3,749 | 7,095 | ||||||||||
Accrued expenses and other | (2,225 | ) | (2,932 | ) | (538 | ) | (235 | ) | ||||||||
Unearned revenue | 906 | 888 | 838 | 1,133 | ||||||||||||
Net cash provided by (used in) operating activities | (1,791 | ) | 1,846 | 18,194 | 34,360 | |||||||||||
INVESTING ACTIVITIES: | ||||||||||||||||
Purchases of property and equipment | (3,098 | ) | (3,290 | ) | (12,905 | ) | (13,619 | ) | ||||||||
Proceeds from property and equipment incentives | 371 | 569 | 1,981 | 2,303 | ||||||||||||
Acquisitions, net of cash acquired, and other | (13 | ) | (1,169 | ) | (13,939 | ) | (3,342 | ) | ||||||||
Sales and maturities of marketable securities | 2,677 | 2,643 | 10,444 | 8,205 | ||||||||||||
Purchases of marketable securities | (470 | ) | (6,876 | ) | (11,846 | ) | (13,506 | ) | ||||||||
Net cash provided by (used in) investing activities | (533 | ) | (8,123 | ) | (26,265 | ) | (19,959 | ) | ||||||||
FINANCING ACTIVITIES: | ||||||||||||||||
Proceeds from long-term debt and other | 125 | 190 | 16,332 | 833 | ||||||||||||
Repayments of long-term debt and other | (202 | ) | (351 | ) | (1,463 | ) | (817 | ) | ||||||||
Principal repayments of finance leases | (2,015 | ) | (2,214 | ) | (5,981 | ) | (7,649 | ) | ||||||||
Principal repayments of financing obligations | (72 | ) | (2 | ) | (235 | ) | (266 | ) | ||||||||
Net cash provided by (used in) financing activities | (2,164 | ) | (2,377 | ) | 8,653 | (7,899 | ) | |||||||||
Foreign currency effect on cash, cash equivalents, and restricted cash |
248 | (12 | ) | 733 | (611 | ) | ||||||||||
Net increase (decrease) in cash, cash equivalents, and restricted cash |
(4,240 | ) | (8,666 | ) | 1,315 | 5,891 | ||||||||||
CASH, CASH EQUIVALENTS, AND RESTRICTED CASH, END OF PERIOD | $ | 17,616 | $ | 23,507 | $ | 17,616 | $ | 23,507 | ||||||||
SUPPLEMENTAL CASH FLOW INFORMATION: | ||||||||||||||||
Cash paid for interest on long-term debt | $ | 282 | $ | 286 | $ | 607 | $ | 858 | ||||||||
Cash paid for operating leases | — | 709 | — | 709 | ||||||||||||
Cash paid for interest on finance leases | 75 | 165 | 234 | 471 | ||||||||||||
Cash paid for interest on financing obligations | 54 | 2 | 153 | 142 | ||||||||||||
Cash paid for income taxes, net of refunds | 513 | 168 | 1,224 | 840 | ||||||||||||
Assets acquired under operating leases | — | 875 | — | 875 | ||||||||||||
Property and equipment acquired under finance leases | 2,270 | 2,628 | 10,020 | 10,972 | ||||||||||||
Property and equipment acquired under build-to-suit arrangements | 741 | 436 | 3,081 | 3,336 | ||||||||||||
_____________________ |
On January 1, 2019, we adopted accounting guidance amending the
accounting for leases, which did not have a material impact on our Q1
2019 operating results. Prior period amounts were not retrospectively
adjusted. Under this new guidance, leases we previously referred to as
“capital leases” are now referred to as “finance leases.” Leases we
previously referred to as “finance leases” are now referred to as
“financing obligations.”
AMAZON.COM, INC. | ||||||||
Consolidated Statements of Operations | ||||||||
(in millions, except per share data) | ||||||||
(unaudited) | ||||||||
Three Months Ended March 31, |
||||||||
2018 | 2019 | |||||||
Net product sales | $ | 31,605 | $ | 34,283 | ||||
Net service sales | 19,437 | 25,417 | ||||||
Total net sales | 51,042 | 59,700 | ||||||
Operating expenses: | ||||||||
Cost of sales | 30,735 | 33,920 | ||||||
Fulfillment | 7,792 | 8,601 | ||||||
Marketing | 2,699 | 3,664 | ||||||
Technology and content | 6,759 | 7,927 | ||||||
General and administrative | 1,067 | 1,173 | ||||||
Other operating expense (income), net | 63 | (5 | ) | |||||
Total operating expenses | 49,115 | 55,280 | ||||||
Operating income | 1,927 | 4,420 | ||||||
Interest income | 80 | 183 | ||||||
Interest expense | (330 | ) | (366 | ) | ||||
Other income (expense), net | 239 | 164 | ||||||
Total non-operating income (expense) | (11 | ) | (19 | ) | ||||
Income before income taxes | 1,916 | 4,401 | ||||||
Provision for income taxes | (287 | ) | (836 | ) | ||||
Equity-method investment activity, net of tax | — | (4 | ) | |||||
Net income | $ | 1,629 | $ | 3,561 | ||||
Basic earnings per share | $ | 3.36 | $ | 7.24 | ||||
Diluted earnings per share | $ | 3.27 | $ | 7.09 | ||||
Weighted-average shares used in computation of earnings per share: | ||||||||
Basic | 484 | 491 | ||||||
Diluted | 498 | 502 | ||||||
Contacts
Amazon.com Investor Relations
Dave Fildes, amazon-ir@amazon.com
amazon.com/ir
Amazon.com Public Relations
Dan Perlet, amazon-pr@amazon.com
amazon.com/pr