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Andy Jassy, CEO of Amazon, speaks at the ceremonial ribbon cutting prior to tomorrow’s opening night for the NHL’s newest hockey franchise the Seattle Kraken at the Climate Pledge Arena on October 22, 2021, in Seattle.

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Amazon is scheduled to report first-quarter earnings after market close Thursday.

Here’s what Wall Street is expecting:

  • Earnings: 21 cents per share, according to analysts surveyed by Refinitiv
  • Revenue: $124.5 billion, according to analysts surveyed by Refinitiv

Here’s how other key Amazon segments are expected to report:

  • Amazon Web Services: $21.22 billion, according to StreetAccount
  • Advertising: $9.08 billion, according to StreetAccount

Amazon’s report will round out a busy week of earnings for the mega-cap tech companies. Meta on Wednesday posted its first sales increase in four quarters. On Tuesday, Microsoft beat analysts’ expectations, while Alphabet topped estimates and said its cloud business turned profitable. Apple is scheduled to report fiscal second-quarter results on May 4.

The key focus for Amazon will be on its cloud computing division, which is facing slowing growth as businesses trim their cloud spending amid a challenging economic environment. Last quarter, Amazon Web Services missed estimates, growing 20% in the period, down from 27.5% in the third quarter.

“On the Q4 earnings call, management stated that AWS grew mid-teens [year-over-year] in January, which represents a further deceleration from the 20% growth in 4Q22,” Jefferies analysts, who maintain a buy rating on Amazon shares, wrote in a note to clients Tuesday. They said AWS growth is likely to come in at 13% in the first quarter.

CEO Andy Jassy has been aggressively cutting costs in an effort to bolster profitability. The company is in the middle of layoffs that are expected to lead to 9,000 job cuts across Amazon’s AWS, advertising, human resources, video games and Twitch livestreaming units. Combined with the 18,000 people it let go in recent months, the cuts amount to the biggest downsizing in Amazon’s 29-year history.

Jassy has been winding down some of Amazon’s more unproven bets and slowing warehouse expansion. On Wednesday, Amazon announced it would stop selling its line of Halo health and fitness devices and disband the team working on the effort, which resulted in some layoffs.

Amazon is also contending with decelerating growth in its core retail segment. The Covid pandemic-fueled e-commerce boom has fizzled as consumers have increasingly returned to physical stores. Shoppers have also been more cautious with their discretionary spending amid rising food and gas prices.

Jassy told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” earlier this month that Amazon has observed consumers being more careful about their spending, and trading down to more affordable products when making purchases.

Even amid the cost cuts, Jassy said Amazon is investing in areas like grocery, health care, its Kuiper internet satellite service and generative artificial intelligence. AWS recently jumped into the generative AI race with the launch of Bedrock, a service that lets developers use large language models developed by Amazon and others to create their own tools.

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Chinese tech giant Tencent posts 13% revenue jump as growth at key gaming unit surges

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May 14, 2025

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Chinese tech giant Tencent posts 13% revenue jump as growth at key gaming unit surges

Chinese tech company Tencent is a gaming giant and the parent company of WeChat, the ubiquitous social messaging app in China.

Cheng Xin | Getty Images News | Getty Images

Tencent on Wednesday reported an annual rise in its top and bottom line in the first quarter fuelled by accelerated growth in its key gaming business.

While revenue beat expectations, its net profit fell short.

Here’s how Tencent did in the first quarter of 2025 versus LSEG estimates:

  • Revenue: 180.02 billion Chinese yuan ($25 billion), versus 174.63 billion yuan expected
  • Net profit: 47.8 billion yuan, versus 52.2 billion yuan expected

Revenue rose 13% year-on-year, while net profit was up 14%.

This breaking news story is being updated.

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Sony shares rise about 2% in volatile trading following share buyback announcement

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May 14, 2025

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Sony shares rise about 2% in volatile trading following share buyback announcement

A file photo of Hiroki Totoki, Sony Group Corporation executive, delivering a keynote address at CES 2025 in Las Vegas, on January 6, 2025. 

Artur Widak | Nurphoto | Getty Images

Sony Group shares rose about 2% Wednesday in volatile trading after the Japanese conglomerate announced a 250 billion yen ($1.7 billion) share buyback and operating income beat estimates.   

Operating income for the last three months of the financial year came in at 203.6 billion yen, beating mean analyst estimates of 192.2 billion yen, though it was down 11% from the same period last year. 

In the earnings report, the Japanese-based electronics, entertainment and finance company announced a stock buyback of shares worth 250 billion yen. 

Sony also provided details on a partial spinoff of its financial unit. The company plans to distribute slightly more than 80% of the shares of common stock of the spinoff to shareholders of Sony Group through dividends. 

The financial unit will list its financial operation this year and will be classified as a discontinued operation in Sony’s accounting from the current quarter, the company added. 

However, Sony’s outlook for the current financial year ending in March was lackluster.

The company forecasted its operating profit to rise a slight 0.3% to 1.28 trillion yen, after flagging a 100 billion yen hit from U.S. President Donald Trump’s trade war.

Yet, Sony clarified that the estimated tariff impact did not reflect the trade deal made between the U.S. and China on May 12 and that the actual impact could vary significantly. 

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Samsung Electronics to acquire heating and cooling solutions provider FläktGroup for 1.5 billion euros

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May 14, 2025

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Samsung Electronics to acquire heating and cooling solutions provider FläktGroup for 1.5 billion euros

A Samsung Group flag flutters in front of the company’s Seocho building in Seoul. 

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Samsung Electronics on Wednesday announced that it would acquire all shares of German-based FläktGroup, a leading heating and cooling solutions provider, for 1.5 billion euros ($1.68 billion) from European investment firm Triton. 

Samsung said the acquisition would help it expand in the heating, ventilation and air conditioning business as the market experiences rapid growth. 

“Our commitment is to continue investing in and developing the high-growth HVAC business as a key future growth engine,” said TM Roh, Acting Head of the Device eXperience (DX) Division at Samsung Electronics.  

The acquisition of FläktGroup stands to bolster Samsung’s position in the HVAC market against rivals such as LG Electronics. 

FläktGroup supplies heating, HVAC solutions to a wide range of buildings and facilities, notably data centers which require a high degree of stable cooling. Samsung said it anticipates sustained growth in data center demand due to the proliferation of generative AI, robotics, autonomous driving and other technologies.

FläktGroup has more 60 major customers, including leading pharmaceutical companies, biotech and food and beverage firms, and gigafactories, according to Samsung’s statement.

Samsung said in March that its HVAC solutions had achieved double-digit annual revenue growth over the past five years, and that the company aimed to boost revenue by more than 30% in 2025.

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