4 notable information from Amazon's latest holiday information
Amazon.com (AMZN) was a bit more reserved about what it chose to share about seasonal sales this year compared to last year. But it gave away some useful nuggets for investors. These include:
1. Alexa-based shopping grew significantly
Amazon says – without giving sales figures – "using Alexa to trade more than tripled" this holiday season compared to last year's. The comments come a year after the firm stated that "millions of premiers" used Alexa for speech coverage.
The rapid growth seen in the installed base of Alexa-compatible devices – thanks to both Amazon's own hardware sales and third-party mushrooming that support Amazon's voice assistant ̵[ads1]1; is obviously a lot to do with Alexa's voice-shopping momentum. It also makes (judging by survey data) increasing consumer knowledge and comfort with the concept of placing online orders with voice.
Voice trading is not ideal for any e-commerce use – generally it works best when consumers know exactly what they want to buy and from whom. But there are certain elements, such as consumer staples purchased on a recurring basis, which may be more convenient than shopping through a website or app. And although Alphabets (GOOGL) Google Assistant will enable some of it, Amazon is pretty good positioned to drive much of that activity in the United States and elsewhere.
2. "Thousands of Millions" Signed for Prime
"Thousand Millions" of people joined the Prime Free Trials and paid membership, Amazon says, which usually sees entries for the 30-day Prime Trials spike in the holidays. The company did not make a similar comment last year, but it said when it recorded over four million new attempts and paid membership in a single week.
Amazon is eight months removed from announcing that its global premium membership count has topped 100 million. In the third quarter, the company's subscription services, which include premium fees, as well as services such as Amazon Channels and Music Unlimited, increased by 52% year-on-year to $ 3.7 billion.
3. The average American premium account is likely to be ordered more than a dozen items
Amazon says over one billion items were shipped for free in the US via Prime. The company has not broken out how many Prime accounts it has in the United States. But the figure is possibly around 60 million, based on a Cowen estimate from January (with a survey of 2,500 consumers). Another estimate, made by the research firm CIRP in October, shows that there are 97 million US premiers, but this figure seems to count on more consumers in the same Prime account.
Assuming that Cowen's estimate is close to the mark, Amazon is likely to ship over a dozen items per US premium account this holiday season, and perhaps more than 15 items. The average US Prime member also spends $ 1,400 a year on Amazon, CIRP estimates, and data from ecommerce analytics firm Rakuten Intelligence indicates that Amazon's e-commerce share spikes during the week before Christmas, as consumers rely on it more than rivals deliver orders on time.
4. An iPad made Amazon's list of best-selling electronic devices
Amazon says that in addition to products such as Bose's QuietComfort 35 wireless headphones and a 65-inch, 4K, Samsung TV, 32GB, space gray, Wi -Final version of Apple's (AAPL) standard iPad was among the best-selling electronics products this holiday season. The tablet, along with other Wi-Fi-only standard iPad models, has been discounted over the past few weeks,
The fact that Amazon gave an Apple device an exclamation in its after-Christmas PR (as opposed to previous years) Only be a new sign of thawing ties between the companies. In November, it was learned that Amazon and Apple had signed an agreement where several Apple products will be sold directly by Amazon (instead of third-party sellers). And just over a month later, Amazon's Echo speakers began supporting Apple Music content.
Amazon.com, Alphabet and Apple are holdings in Jim Cramer's Action Alerts PLUS Member Club . Want to be notified before Jim Cramer buys or sells AMZN, AAPL or GOOGL? Learn more now.
