Sanders Morris Harris LLC Raises Stake in Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN)

Sanders Morris Harris LLC grew its holdings in shares of Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) by 0.5% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 16,987 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock after acquiring an additional 77 shares during the quarter. Sanders Morris Harris LLC’s holdings in Amazon.com were worth $3,743,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Rench Wealth Management Inc. raised its holdings in Amazon.com by 7.9% in the 3rd quarter. Rench Wealth Management Inc. now owns 50,403 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $9,392,000 after purchasing an additional 3,703 shares in the last quarter. Foundations Investment Advisors LLC increased its position in shares of Amazon.com by 9.7% during the third quarter. Foundations Investment Advisors LLC now owns 184,594 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock valued at $34,395,000 after buying an additional 16,392 shares during the period. Blankinship & Foster LLC raised its stake in Amazon.com by 216.4% in the third quarter. Blankinship & Foster LLC now owns 6,930 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $1,291,000 after buying an additional 4,740 shares in the last quarter. Umpqua Bank lifted its holdings in Amazon.com by 0.4% in the third quarter. Umpqua Bank now owns 35,120 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $6,544,000 after buying an additional 137 shares during the period. Finally, Floyd Financial Group LLC bought a new stake in Amazon.com during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $4,494,000. 72.20% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts have issued reports on the company. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their price objective on Amazon.com from $250.00 to $280.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Wednesday, December 18th. HSBC upped their price objective on shares of Amazon.com from $225.00 to $270.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, January 13th. Mizuho lifted their target price on shares of Amazon.com from $240.00 to $260.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Tuesday, December 10th. Sanford C. Bernstein upped their price target on Amazon.com from $235.00 to $265.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, December 18th. Finally, Needham & Company LLC reissued a “buy” rating and issued a $250.00 target price on shares of Amazon.com in a research note on Tuesday, January 21st. Two analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, forty-two have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $249.46.

Amazon.com Stock Performance

Shares of AMZN stock opened at $237.07 on Thursday. The stock’s 50-day moving average price is $221.62 and its 200 day moving average price is $198.03. Amazon.com, Inc. has a 52-week low of $151.61 and a 52-week high of $241.77. The stock has a market capitalization of $2.49 trillion, a PE ratio of 50.76, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.31 and a beta of 1.14. The company has a quick ratio of 0.87, a current ratio of 1.09 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.21.

Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, October 31st. The e-commerce giant reported $1.43 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.14 by $0.29. The firm had revenue of $158.88 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $157.28 billion. Amazon.com had a return on equity of 22.41% and a net margin of 8.04%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 11.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the company earned $0.85 earnings per share. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Amazon.com, Inc. will post 5.39 EPS for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, insider Jeffrey P. Bezos sold 2,996,362 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, November 8th. The stock was sold at an average price of $208.85, for a total value of $625,790,203.70. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 917,416,976 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $191,602,535,437.60. The trade was a 0.33 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Also, Director Jonathan Rubinstein sold 4,351 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, December 9th. The stock was sold at an average price of $229.85, for a total value of $1,000,077.35. Following the transaction, the director now directly owns 88,203 shares in the company, valued at approximately $20,273,459.55. This represents a 4.70 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 6,032,344 shares of company stock valued at $1,253,456,822 over the last ninety days. Corporate insiders own 10.80% of the company’s stock.

Amazon.com Company Profile

Amazon.com, Inc engages in the retail sale of consumer products, advertising, and subscriptions service through online and physical stores in North America and internationally. The company operates through three segments: North America, International, and Amazon Web Services (AWS). It also manufactures and sells electronic devices, including Kindle, Fire tablets, Fire TVs, Echo, Ring, Blink, and eero; and develops and produces media content.