Amazon sales surge, so does net loss

Second quarter sales at Amazon increased 23% to $19.3 billion thanks to growth of new and existing products, but the company reported an even bigger loss than it did the prior year.

Amazon said it lost $126 million, or 27 cents a share, during the quarter ended June 30, compared to a loss of $7 million, or two cents a share the prior year. Despite the loss, Amazon highlighted growth of its operating cash flow which increased 18% to $5.3 billion for the trailing 12 months period. Free cash flow increased to slightly more than $1 billion compared to $265 million for the prior year 12 month period.

Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos typically doesn’t address the company’s financial performance and he held true to form in the second quarter with remarks focused on customers and products.

“We continue working hard on making the Amazon customer experience better and better,” Bezos said. “We’ve recently introduced Sunday delivery coverage to 25% of the U.S. population, launched European cross-border Two-Day Delivery for Prime, launched Prime Music with over one million songs, created three original kids TV series, added world-class parental controls to Fire TV with FreeTime, and launched Kindle Unlimited, an eBook subscription service.”

He also touched on a range of new services introduced under the Amazon Web Service platform and hailed the launch of the company’s new Fire smartphones which shipped recently.

“We can’t wait to get them in customers’ hands,” Bezos said.

Looking ahead, the company forecast a wide range of sales and operating loss possibilities for the third quarter. Net sales are expected to be between $19.7 billion and $21.5 billion while the company’s operating loss is forecast to range from $810 million and $410 million, compared to a $25 million operating loss in the third quarter 2013.