Amazon.com delivered significant sales and profit gains in the fourth quarter and the full fiscal year, with general merchandise revenues in North America advancing sharply.
For the fourth quarter ended December 31, net income was $749 million, or $1.54 per diluted share, versus $482 million, or $1 per diluted share, in the year-previous quarter. Amazon beat a MarketBeat published analyst average earnings per diluted share estimate of $1.35.
Net sales in the quarter increased 22% to $43.7 billion, with $30.63 billion coming from product and $13.11 billion from service revenue. With a $558 million unfavorable impact from changes in foreign exchange rates excluded, net sales increased 24% versus the year-previous quarter.
Operating income gained to $1.3 billion from $1.1 billion in the 2015 first quarter.
In North America, Amazon sales advanced to $26.24 billion from $21.5 billion in the quarter as operating income increased to $816 million from $636 million in the period a year earlier. Amazon Web Services sales, focused on the commercial market, gained to $3.54 billion from $2.41 billion in the quarter as operating income increased to $926 million from $580 million in the period a year prior.
In North America, Amazon media sales increased to $4.21 billion from $3.93 billion in the year-previous quarter as electronics and other general merchandise sales advanced to $21.59 billion from $17.33 billion and other sales gaining to $442 million from $245 million in the year-before period.
For the full fiscal year, Amazon net income was $2.37 billion, or $4.90 per diluted share, versus $596 million, or $1.25 per diluted share, in the year earlier. Net sales increased 27% to $135.99 billion versus the 2015 fiscal year. With a negative $550 million foreign exchange rate effect excluded, net sales increased 28% versus the prior-year quarter. Operating income was $4.2 billion, compared with $2.2 billion in 2015.
“Our Prime team’s customer obsession kept them busy in 2016,” said Jeff Bezos, Amazon founder and CEO. “Prime members can now choose from over 50 million items with free two-day shipping, up 73% since 2015. Prime Video is now available in more than 200 countries and territories. Prime Now added 18 new cities, which means millions more members now get one- and two-hour delivery. New benefits were also added to the list, like Prime Reading, Audible Channels for Prime, Twitch Prime and more. And customers noticed: Tens of millions of new paid members joined the program in just this past year.”
