Report Overview

Amazon Q1 2020 results – Profit growth takes a back seat

Amazon reported $75bn in net sales, which was largely in line with expectations, and 28% growth in Prime subscription revenue—as Amazon now has more than 150 million Prime subscribers worldwide—cementing its place as the irreplaceable utility for many in lockdown

However, Q1 results only covered a few weeks of lockdown. Amazon expects low profitability in Q2 as lockdown persists in its main markets, with customer expenditure focused on a narrow basket of essentials as people face pressures from unemployment and business closures

Amazon’s warehouses are a key vulnerability in the time of COVID-19. Jeff Bezos pledged $4bn to keep workers safe and warehouses in function, though whether this is enough to placate government’s and workers’ concerns is yet to be seen

Contents

Business as normal?

Non-retail growth looks healthy

List of charts/tables

Figure 1: Amazon net sales ($bn) and year-on-year growth (%)

Figure 2: Growth rate for the value of goods sold, by category (%)

Figure 3: Share of physical gross merchandise sales on Amazon (%)

Figure 4: AWS net sales and operating income ($bn)