盈利不及預期導致亞馬遜股價大跌6%

Amazon shares fell 6 per cent in after-hours trading in New York on Thursday when the online retailer significantly missed earnings expectations in the third quarter, and forecast operating income of as little as zero next quarter.

週四，亞馬遜(Amazon)股價在紐約盤後交易時段大跌了6%，因為這家線上零售商在第三季度的盈利嚴重不及預期，並預期下一季度營業利潤最低可能為零。

Investment in distribution warehouses, video content from top tier directors and actors and the engineering teams behind virtual assistant Alexa helped push operating costs up 29 per cent — and look set to continue into the holiday shopping season.

亞馬遜對於分銷倉庫、來自頂級導演和演員的視訊內容以及虛擬助理Alexa背後工程團隊的投資，幫助推動其運營成本增加了29%。看來這一趨勢在進入假日購物季之後會延續下去。

Brian Olsavsky, chief financial officer, said it had opened 18 fulfilment centres during the quarter, the biggest growth in the delivery network since 2012.

亞馬遜的首席財務官布萊恩.奧爾薩夫斯基(Brian Olsavsky)表示，第三季度亞馬遜已開設了18個履行作業中心，為2012年以來配送網路擴張速度最快的一次。

Amazon reported earnings per share of 52 cents, up more than 200 per cent from the same period last year, but far from the average analyst estimate of 78 cents for the three months ended September. Net income was $252m.

亞馬遜公告稱，每股盈利為52美分，同比增幅超過200%，但遠遠不及分析師對第三季度每股盈利預測的平均值78美分。淨利潤為2.52億美元。

Sales increased 29 per cent to $32.7bn, meeting the consensus forecast, with retail sales in North America up 26 per cent and international retail sales rising 28 per cent.

銷售額增加29%，至327億美元，符合共識預測。北美地區零售額增加26%，國外零售額增加28%。

Revenue from Amazon Web Services soared 55 per cent to $3.2bn, the biggest year-on-year leap in sales, as prices came down and AWS rolled out new features. The operating margin at AWS increased to 31.6 per cent.

隨著價格下調，亞馬遜網路服務(AWS)推出新功能，AWS業務收入大漲55%，至32億美元，為同比增幅最大的一次。AWS營業利潤率上升至31.6%。

For the crucial fourth quarter, where retailers revel in holiday season shopping, Amazon forecast sales between $42bn and $45.5bn, up between 17 and 27 per cent compared with the fourth quarter of 2015. But it said it expected operating income of between zero and $1.3bn, compared with $1.1bn in the fourth quarter of 2015.

對於關鍵的第四季度，亞馬遜預計銷售額將達420億至455億美元，同比增加17%至27%。但亞馬遜表示，預計營業利潤將為0至13億美元，而去年第四季度為11億美元。