Amazon swung to a wide profit in the latest quarter, nearly doubling the earnings per share that analysts expected in the period. And the online retail giant also predicted positive revenue trends in the current period.
Shares jumped 11 percent to $670 in after-hours trade at 4:05 p.m. ET. Through the close, the stock had declined about 11 percent in the last year.
The results are the first since Amazon began offering a stand-alone subscription to its Prime Video service that rivals Netflix. Earlier this month, Amazon challenged its bigger competitor head-on by allowing customers the option of signing up for its video-streaming service by itself, at a monthly price one buck cheaper than Netflix’s most popular tier.
Amazon kept with tradition Thursday and didn’t break out financial details of its video service or its Prime memberships, which are best known for providing free, two-day shipping.
In the first quarter, Amazon reported a profit of $512 million, or $1.07 a share, swinging from a loss of $57 million, or 12 cents a share, a year earlier.
Revenue jumped 28 percent to $29.128 billion.
Analysts on average were expecting 58 cents a share in profit on $27.979 billion in revenue.
And in the current quarter, Amazon predicted sales would range between $28 billion and $30.5 billion. The midpoint of that guidance is above analysts consensus estimate for $28.328 billion.
The results were bolstered by its Amazon Web Services, the cloud-computing division that handles data networks for big companies (including its streaming video rival Netflix). The unit has be a major driver of profit growth for Amazon, with sales jumping 64 percent in the first quarter.