Amazon shares got a skyrocketing price target hike from Goldman Sachs, on the e-commerce giant’s prospects during COVID-19 pandemic. Analysts at Goldman Sachs raised its share-price target +12% to $2,900, the highest on Wall Street.Goldman re-affirmed its buy rating. This comes close on the heels of   Jefferies setting a Wall Street high, with a target of $2,800. During the coronavirus pandemic,  consumers are relying more on online shopping, while companies are using Amazon’s cloud services to allow operations with workers at home – something that Goldman analysts have taken into consideration in setting their price target. "The market continues to underestimate the long-term value" of Amazon, Goldman analyst Heath Terry wrote in a report.

Amazon.com is reportedly putting its  delivery service business on hold . According to a Wall Street Journal report, the e-commerce behemoth will not operate its Amazon Shipping  starting in June, in order to focus on online orders amid the coronavirus outbreak. Amazon's foray into the delivery sector had apparently led to FedEx terminating its contract to deliver packages for the online retailer last August. Even with lower rates, Amazon Shipping, since its  launch two years ago, struggled to gain customers beyond its own delivery purposes, J.P. Morgan analyst Brian Ossenbeck mentioned in a note to clients.Ossenbeck arges that Amazon’s halting of its delivery business will give a bigger boost to FedEx than UPS.  

They would also demand  coronavirus testing for all employees, along with hazard compensation of double the current hourly wage for employees who come to work. Whole Worker is the national worker group organizing the sick out.The organization stated, “We cannot wait for politicians, institutions, or our own management to step in to protect us.” In recent times, Whole Foods temporarily raised worker's hourly pay by $2 an hour.

Amazon is drastically boosting hiring, to support demand amid COVID-19 outbreak.  The e-commerce giant is looking  to hire 100,000 warehouse and delivery workers in the U.S.  , to meet demand amid Coronavirus crisis. The company will also raise salaries by $2 through April.The total pay raises will be more than $350 million in additional compensation for its hourly workers in the U.S., Europe and Canada., according to Amazon. With COVID-19 propelling many people to stay indoors, there is apparently a surge in demand for online shopping.  

Alibaba Group Holding Co. reported third quarter earnings that topped analyst expectations. The e-commerce giant's diluted non-GAAP earnings for the three months ending in December came in at $2.61 per share, exceeding the Street's estimate of around $2.27 per share. Alibaba’s total revenue surged +38% year-over-year to $23.192 billion, which is higher than analysts' estimates of a $22.87 billion. The company’s cloud computing segment’s revenues climbed +62% to a record $1.5 billion.  Alibaba garnered 10 billion yuan ($1.43 billion) in sales over the first 90 seconds of Singles' Day.The shopping bonanza’s sales touched $38.379 billion in gross merchandise value as of its closing, compared to last year's 24-hour total of $30.8 billion. Furthermore, CEO Daniel Zhang  mentioned the company’s response to the coronavirus.

Chewy Inc. shares declined during pre-market trading Tuesday - after reporting wider-than-expected losses the previous day, and ahead of the expiry of early investors’  lock-up period. On Monday, the online retailer of pet food and other pet-related products reported  third quarter loss of -20 cents per share –which was wider than anticipated. However, total sales increased +40% from the same period last year to $1.23 billion.It projects adjusted operating profit margin improvement of between 4.4% and 4.6%. In June, Chewy went public, finishing its first day of trading at $34.99 per share , +59% above its IPO price.

Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.'s Singles Day shopping festival registered a record $38.4 billion in sales Monday. The e-commerce giant saw 10 billion yuan ($1.43 billion) in sales over the first 90 seconds of the event.Total Singles Day sales touched $38.379 billion in gross merchandise value this year, surpassing last year's 24-hour total of $30.8 billion. This year’s sales growth of 26% was faster compared to last year's 21%.

Sea Limited (NYSE: SE) is an electronic gaming and multimedia company based in Singapore.With the negative readings in these key indicators, the Tickeron SMR rating for Sea Ltd. is 100, the worst rating a company can get.

But top-line figure handily surpassed estimates. The e-commerce behemoth reported earnings of $4.23 a share, which fell behind analysts’ estimate of $4.62 (based on analysts surveyed by Refinitiv). However, revenue surged +24% year-over-year to $70 billion, beating analysts’ expectation of $68.8 billion (based on Refinitiv poll). Amazon Web Services registered revenue of $9 billion in the quarter, compared to $9.1 billion expected by analysts surveyed by FactSet.International revenues (26.2% of sales) increased +18% year over year to $18.35 billion.  Tailwinds to Amazon's revenue growth came in the form of strong performance of the company's  free one-day delivery service, and expansion of Prime Video content.

Bed Bath & Beyond Inc. shares traded lower on Thursday, after the company posted weaker-than-expected same store sales over its fiscal second quarter, and lowered its full-year earnings guidance. For the three months ending August, the home furnishings retail company’s adjusted earnings decreased -10.5% year-over-year to 34 cents per share, but was still 5 cents ahead of the Street consensus expectation. Net sales fell -7.3% to $2.7 billion, slightly below analysts' estimates of $2.76 billion. Same store sales declined -6.7%, compared to the - 5.4% decrease that investors had been expecting.  Looking into the full-year 2019, Bed Bath & Beyond is expecting earnings to range between $2.08 and $2.13 per share, down from its previous forecast of $2.11 to $2.20.   

Chewy reported a wider-than-expected fiscal-second-quarter loss, thereby sending its shares lower on Wednesday. For the three months ended Aug. 4, the online retailer of pet food & products reported a loss of - 21 cents a share, worse than analysts’ estimate of -11 cents (based on FactSet).Analysts were expecting revenue of $1.13 billion, according to FactSet. For the fiscal third-quarter, Chewy expects sales to come in between $1.19 billion and $1.21 billion, a year-over-year increase of 36% to 38%. Analysts’ had predicted sales of $1.16 billion.  

E-commerce giant Amazon.com  reportedly made some tweaks to its product search algorithm in an attempt to give greater prominence to products that are more profitable for the company, according to a Wall Street Journal report. Citing people who worked on the project, The Journal indicated that Amazon optimized its algorithm in a way that boosts listings of items that are profitable for the company – not just those that are most relevant or bestsellers corresponding to customers’ searches. The report also mentioned that the algo adjustment was made late last year, and followed a conflict between executives who run the company’s retail division in Seattle and a search team in California called A9, which was opposed to the change. Amazon, however, denied the allegations.Its spokeswoman Angie Newman has indicated to the Journal that the company designs its search results to reflect  customers preferences, irrespective of whether they are the company’s  own brands or

The analyst’s price target on the shares is $48. Senior research analyst Tom Forte indicated in a note that DA Davidson  believes that Overstock's Interim CEO, Jonathan Johnson (who is also the chairman of tZero) is well positioned to lead Overstock (including its Medici Ventures' effort that includes tZero).In recent times, Overstock is looking to branch out (from its e-commerce business) to offer blockchain services, including its tZero cryptocurrency. Last month, Overstock’s long-time CEO Patrick Byrne resigned citing distraction and fallout related to his involvement in a Federal Bureau of Investigation Russian espionage probe.    

Chinese internet firm Baozun (Nasdaq: BZUN) reported earnings on August 21.In fact the stock dropped 12.6% on August 21. This was a little puzzling to me and I started looking back at the last couple of earnings reports.

Grubhub shares slumped on Tuesday, after the online food ordering & delivery company reported adjusted second-quarter earnings that missed analysts' estimates. The company’s earnings came in at 1 cent a share in the second quarter, down -96% from 33 cents a share in the year-earlier quarter.Adjusted earnings per share was 50 cents a year earlier. Total costs and expenses rose +55.3% to $318.9 million. However, the company’s revenue for the quarter surged +36% to $325.1 million, beating analysts’ estimate of $318.2 million. Grubhub said that active users of its website increased +30% to 20.3 million, and daily average orders went up +16% to almost 489,000. Looking ahead, the company expects revenue of $320 million to $340 million for the third quarter, compared to FactSet's consensus expectation of $331.7 million.

 KeyBanc analyst  Edward Yruma mentioned that Prime Day emerged as the largest sales day in Amazon history, and was even bigger than  Black Friday and Cyber Monday combined.  Meanwhile, Deutsche Bank analysts raised their price target on Amazon to $2,515 , up from $2,315.Analyst Lloyd Walmsley seems to be hopeful on the company's revenue and unit growth in the third quarter, which should cover some of the costs associated with the company’s move to one-day prime shipping. Walmsley also indicated that it is difficult for competitors to match Amazon’s delivery speed and costs even in the mid-to-long term, given limitations of scale.  

Overstock.com shares jumped Tuesday, following a re-iteration of buy rating from a DA Davidson analyst. Reiterating a $48 price target on the stock, DA Davidson's Tom Forte said that the internet retail company is experiencing improving trends in its legacy retail business.He said that better-than-expected financial results point towards the company's retail business' ability to generate enough cash to cover Blockchain's operating cash burn.  

Bed Bath & Beyond Inc. reported losses for its fiscal-first-quarter, as costs related to goodwill impairment and severance tugged at its bottom line.However, adjusted earnings beat estimates. For the quarter ended June 1, the household-goods retail chain posted a loss of -$371.1 million (or -$2.91 a share), compared to earnings of $43.6 million (or 32 cents) in the year-ago period. However, adjusting for the impairment charge as well as severance and other costs, Bed Bath & Beyond’s earnings came in at 12 cents a share, which surpassed analysts’ estimates of adjusted earnings of 8 cents per share.

Amazon employees in Minnesota are reportedly planning a strike on Prime Day. According to a Bloomberg report, employees at an Amazon fulfillment center in Shakopee, Minnesota, are planning to halt work for six hours on July 15, the day when the 48-hour Prime Day extravaganza is scheduled to begin.The news comes even after the company promised to pay all employees at least $15 an hour last year. Bloomberg reported that organizers said that talks between employees and management last fall led to some changes, including relaxing quotas during Ramadan and the designation of a conference room as a prayer space.

The Competition and Markets Authority in the U.K. has asked e-commerce giant Amazon to halt its investment into food delivery start-up Deliveroo, as it investigates into the deal. The U.K.’s competition watchdog said it has “reasonable grounds” to suspect that the investment could mean that Amazon and Deliveroo would “cease to be distinct”. In May, Amazon led a $575-million funding round in Deliveroo.While Deliveroo is one of the most popular food delivery firms in Europe, Amazon had shut down its own restaurant delivery service in the U.K. last December.