Santa Claus Weeps: Amazon Lowers Q4 Revenue Forecast

[mandy]

Amazon's third-quarter revenue was in line with analyst expectations, but e-commerce doesn't appear to be immune to the economic slump pounding offline and online retailers alike.

For the quarter ended September 30, Amazon reported $4.26 billion in revenues, up 31 percent compared with $3.26 billion in third quarter of 2007. The numbers came in on the low side of Amazon's forecasts from last summer.

Amazon rival eBay last week lowered fourth-quarter revenue expectations, and Wall Street was very interested to learn how Amazon thought it would fare during the holiday season. Forrester Research expects online retail growth to slow for the first time this holiday season as a result of the weak economy...

Amazon said the fourth quarter, the vital holiday period, will produce revenue of between $6 billion to $7 billion. That represents growth of 6 percent to 23 percent...

full article: http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-1007303...riesArea.0

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“Our latest channel checks with big box retailers as well as e-commerce merchants in the midst of the negative headlines suggest that consumer sentiment and spending activity deteriorated further in mid-September,” Ju says in his research brief. “Whereas the shift in consumer behavior in the beginning of the year seemed targeted toward the higher ticket and discretionary items, the feedback this time suggests that the weakness is more broad-based. In other words, there is a general decrease in willingness to spend.”

Some online retailers will benefit from a recession by being able to grow their market share, he notes...

full article: http://www.internetretailer.com/dailyNews.asp?id=28194