The Bundeskartellamt (Federal Cartel Office) in a press release on Thursday said that it had “initiated an abuse proceeding” against the online giant’s treatment of third-party sellers on it’s website Amazon.de. This investigation is being conducted by the German antitrust authority, in order to see if Amazon was involved in or was preventing fair competition in the country’s online marketplace, after it had received “many complaints” over Amazon’s conduct. Bundeskartellamt President Andreas Mundt in the press conference said that "because of the many complaints we have received, we will examine whether Amazon is abusing its market position to the detriment of sellers active on its marketplace."He further added that the office would be closely monitoring Amazon to see if it’s dominance is hampering other online retailers and whether sellers have become too much dependent on Amazon for their sales. With an investigation already running on Amazon regarding the use of data gathe

Cyber Monday was the biggest shopping day in Amazon’s 24-year history, as indicated by the company. Although the e-commerce giant did not release absolute figures, it said the Monday after Thanksgiving 2018 turned out to be "the single biggest shopping day in the company's history with the most products ordered worldwide". Amazon also mentioned that sales made during the period between Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday reached a record high for the company.During that period, it sold “millions” more products than it did during the same period in 2017. “Black Friday and Cyber Monday continue to break records on Amazon year over year, “ said Jeff Wilke, CEO of Amazon's Worldwide Consumer division. For the holiday season, Amazon offered several ‘gifts’ or incentives to shoppers such as free shipping on almost all items for all customers without any minimum purchase amount required.

Each of the five "FAANG" stocks closed in a bear market on Monday. Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Netflix and Google-parent Alphabet have fallen steadily over the last 6 weeks. Wall Street defines a bear market as a fall of 20 percent or more from a stock's 52-week high. READ MORE...

The term refers to the Monday following the Thanksgiving Holiday, and focuses on digital sales. According to Adobe Analytics, U.S. online retail could expect sales of $7.8 billion this Monday – a +17% climb from the previous year.Adobe also estimates that total online sales will reach $124.1 billion this holiday season (as reported by The Street). The projections should augur well not just for current e-commerce leaders like Amazon, but also for potentially those like Lowe’s who have been struggling for a while.

From turkey to the malls, more than 164 million Americans figured to hit the stores between Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday according to the National Retail Federation.But how will the retailers fare the rest of the holiday season? READ MORE...

Amidst  the start of the biggest shopping season of the year, U.K.-based trade union GMB is protesting against Amazon for what it calls "inhuman" working conditions.GMB said that it expects hundreds of people to take part in the protests at five Amazon warehouses in the U.K. and also hopes workers in Italy and Spain to come forward. Amazon, however, tried to refute claims of inhuman working conditions.

Jeff Bezos predicted to Amazon employees last week that "one day Amazon will fail," according to a recording of an internal meeting heard by CNBC. Bezos added that Amazon's job was to delay failure for as long as possible by focusing on its customers. READ MORE...

Baird Equity Research recently surveyed 670 online shoppers, and the results revealed that Amazon was solidly the preferred online shopping destination -- with nearly 60% preferring Amazon over Walmart. Context is important here, however, as Amazon is newly facing big challenges as both Walmart and Target started investing aggressively to enhance their e-commerce presence and services.It also indicated that Amazon saw a 20% decline in its share of e-commerce growth, thus standing at just above 50%, down from the 70% range in the recent quarters.

Amazon.com said that it shared some of its customers’ information with third parties by mistake. On Wednesday, the e-commerce behemoth emailed an undisclosed number of its users to notify them that their names and email addresses had been inadvertently leaked due to a "technical error".A privacy breach seems a potential threat to any digital platform’s reputation.

Amazon has reportedly placed its first round of bid for Disney’s 22 regional sports networks. Disney had acquired those networks from 21st Century Fox earlier this year as part of a $71.3 billion deal.And now, it might be preparing to divest some of the assets - as Amazon alongwith several private equity firms like Apollo Global Management, KKR, Blackstone and  broadcast-TV companies Tegna and Sinclair participated in the first round of bidding for the regional networks that include the YES Network (which broadcasts New York Yankees games) and other networks showing live regional games  of the Major League Baseball, the National Basketball Association and the National Hockey League, as reported by CNBC, citing sources familiar with the bidding process. What’s more, Fox itself might be willing to buy back those 22 regional sports networks from Disney, as indicated by  Fox CEO Lachlan Murdoch  earlier this month.

Alibaba on Sunday tore through last year's Singles Day sales record, racking up more than $30.8 billion in the 24-hour shopping event. Gross merchandise value (GMV), a figure that shows sales across the Chinese e-commerce giant's various shopping platforms, surpassed last year's $25.3 billion record at around 5:34 p.m. SIN/HK (4:34 a.m.ET) on Sunday, and kept marching higher through the rest of the day. READ MORE...

Black Friday is not too far off, and some analysts & economist are predicting solid consumer demand – something that should add to retailers' 'celebrations'. The National Retail Federation is expecting holiday sales to increase in the range of  +4.3% to +4.8% compared to 2017, which are higher growth rates than the past five years.Amazon ‘s special Christmas shopping offer includes free shipping on all orders, waiving the minimum purchase limit of $25 that otherwise applies to non-Prime users.

On Tuesday, the the e-commerce giant announced that it will split its HQ2 between New York's Long Island City and Northern Virginia’s Arlington County. Last year, Amazon had expressed plans to look for its HQ2, preferably where it can attract skilled people for its jobs and one that has access to mass transit. Hundreds of proposals started to pour in from across 54 states, provinces and districts of North America. Finally on Tuesday, Amazon revealed its choice to divide the second headquarter between two places.

Alibaba’s Singles Day bonanza clocked in a record $30.8 billion in sales over a 24 hour-period. November 11 (11/11) is celebrated in China as Singles Day for people who are single in terms of their relationship status.The growth rate was even faster in 2017 (at 40%). Interestingly, the country which ranked the second highest in terms of goods sold on Alibaba on Singles Day was the U.S. – notwithstanding the ongoing trade tensions and tariff-slapping rounds between China and the U.S.

If you've been paying attention in the past years, it seems that all anyone can talk about is the coming artificial intelligence boom on the horizon.Whether it's the Amazon, Google, or Facebook, everyone seems to be getting in on the AI game as fast as they can. READ MORE...

In recent times, Walmart has reportedly been upping the ante on baby products, including the addition of a new version of its diaper brand. However, the overall prices on Amazon were an average of 13 % lower than those on several other major online retailers,  according to Profitero’s research.But for certain specific categories, Amazon could not offer the cheapest prices: Chewy.com’s pet supplies was 2.3% cheaper, while Jet.com had 0.4% lower prices than Amazon in Beauty and 2.6% cheaper offers in Music & CDs.

This holiday season, Amazon gifts shoppers free shipping on all orders . The Christmas offer, starting Monday, waives the minimum purchase limit of $25 that otherwise applies to non-Prime users.The e-commerce giant’s Prime members get free delivery at other times as well, on eligible orders without a minimum purchase requirement. Amazon’s holiday incentive to shoppers comes at a time when its competitors like Target are also strategizing to milk the season’s consumer demand potential.

eBay has alleged that Amazon poached sellers by misusing an internal messaging system called M2M. In a lawsuit filed against Amazon in Santa Clara County on Wednesday, eBay mentions,  "Amazon's misuse of eBay's M2M system has been coordinated, targeted, and designed to inflict harm on eBay," while adding, "Indeed, one of the Amazon sales representatives who participated in this scheme described the team he worked on as a 'hunter/recruiter team which actively searches for sellers we believe can do well on the [Amazon] platform.On Amazon’s website, third-party sellers (who set prices for their own products, versus wholesaling to Amazon) now account for more than half the units sold on the e-platform. According to eBay's accusation, Amazon is "unwilling to fairly compete for third party seller business."

Amazon is hiking its minimum wage to $15 an hour for all U.S. employees - full-time, part-time and temporary workers.The federal minimum wage has been $7.25 an hour since 2009. Amazon's wage raise policy, which will take effect from November 1, is expected to benefit more than 250,000 Amazon employees, plus 100,000 seasonal workers.  Given Amazon's  size, its expansive internal supply chains and technology, alongwith the rapid growth in its businesses and networking, Amazon’s move on wages could potentially impact the overall U.S. labor market to a substantial degree.The e-commerce giant has added the most number of jobs in the U.S. the past decade. Amazon will also increase minimum wages for its U.K. employees to £10.50 ($13.60) for the London area and £9.50 ($12.30) for the rest of the country.

Amazon-owned live-streaming video game platform Twitch is no longer available to  Chinese consumers. Chinese regulators of late have been increasingly stringent with the video gaming industry, and Twitch’s getting blocked in their nation (including on the iOS store in China) seems to be the latest proof of that.Last month, the Chinese government even imposed restrictions on the amount of time kids/teenagers should spend on new online games. Before losing access to Chinese consumers, Twitch was the third most popular free app in the Chinese iOS store, according to analytics firm App Annie.