Amazon Remains a Long-term Winner

Amazon's longer-term profitability potential remains. Even with online sales tax collection, Amazon will maintain its consumer proposition through other means say analysts

R.J. Hottovy, CFA 28 April, 2015 | 11:21AM
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Amazon (AMZN) has played a key role in the structural shift away from brick-and-mortar retail, and it may lay waste to many other retailers in the years to come. Without the cost burden of physical stores, Amazon can price below traditional rivals and drive recurring traffic online.

Amazon's growth potential is undeniable

Even with online sales tax collection, we believe Amazon will maintain its consumer proposition through other means, including the convenience of Amazon Prime's expedited shipping and expanding digital content library.

Aided by the network effect inherent in 278 million active users and recent fulfilment infrastructure, technology, and content investments, Amazon owns one of the wider economic moats in the consumer sector and is likely to remain a disruptive force in retail, digital media, and cloud computing.

Amazon's growth potential is undeniable. Key top-line metrics, total physical and digital units sold, and third-party units sold continue to outpace global e-commerce trends, suggesting that Amazon is gaining share while fortifying its network effect. Nevertheless, with essentially break-even operating margins in 2014, our fair value estimate seemingly requires a leap of faith based on whether Amazon will be able to monetize its growth.

We acknowledge that Amazon's margin expansion is less visible than its growth trajectory given its investment cycle, including international fulfilment infrastructure and content deals, Amazon Fresh, tablets and other hardware, and new delivery capacity and technologies. Admittedly, some of the company's capital decisions haven't yielded strong returns – the Fire Phone, in particular.

However, based on the strength of its network effect, we remain optimistic that Amazon can exceed 4.5% operating margins by 2019 – 6% excluding stock-based compensation and amortization of intangibles, driven by Amazon Prime memberships and fee increases, monetization of Amazon Web Services, fulfilment centre scale – “getting closer to the consumer”, and third-party sales.

 

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Securities Mentioned in Article

Security NamePriceChange (%)Morningstar
Rating
Amazon.com Inc174.63 USD-2.56Rating

About Author

R.J. Hottovy, CFA  is a director of equity analysis with Morningstar.

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