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The market was pushed and pulled all day long, with most traders unsure of what to make of a surprisingly poor job-growth pace for March. By the time the closing bell rang though, the S&P 500 was at 2,355.54, down a mere 0.08%.

It was anything but a ho-hum session for CarMax, Inc [stckqut]KMX[/stckqut], AngioDynamics, Inc. [stckqut]ANGO[/stckqut] and Domino’s Pizza, Inc. [stckqut]DPZ[/stckqut] though. These three names dished out the most pain to the most people, albeit for understandable reasons.

Domino’s Pizza, Inc. (DPZ)

The end of the first fiscal quarter was only seven days ago, and already we’re hearing sales warnings about key companies.

Domino’s Pizza was today’s biggest victim on that front, with DPZ shareholders being cautioned by an M Science report that its domestic growth for Q1 would likely be “well below the rough consensus estimate.” Domino’s neither confirmed nor denied the rumor, saying it doesn’t respond to third-party prognostications. The market certainly responded though, sending DPZ to a loss of 5.8% for the day.

All will be revealed on April 27, when the company reports last quarter’s results. Analysts are expecting Domino’s Pizza to post income of $1.16 per share on revenue of $615.5 million. Both are up from year-ago figures of 89 cents per share of DPZ and sales of $539.17 million, respectively.

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AMAZON [stckqut]AMZN[/stckqut] is an extraordinary company. The former bookseller accounts for more than half of every new dollar spent online in America. It is the world’s leading provider of cloud computing. This year Amazon will probably spend twice as much on television as HBO, a cable channel. Its own-brand physical products include batteries, almonds, suits and speakers linked to a virtual voice-activated assistant that can control, among other things, your lamps and sprinkler.

Yet Amazon’s shareholders are working on the premise that it is just getting started. Since the beginning of 2015 its share price has jumped by 173%, seven times quicker than in the two previous years (and 12 times faster than the S&P 500 index). With a market capitalisation of some $400bn, it is the fifth-most-valuable firm in the world. Never before has a company been worth so much for so long while making so little money: 92% of its value is due to profits expected after 2020.

That is because investors anticipate both an extraordinary rise in revenue, from sales of $136bn last year to half a trillion over the next decade, and a jump in profits. The hopes invested in it imply that it will probably become more profitable than any other firm in America. Ground for scepticism does not come much more fertile than this: Amazon will have to grow faster than almost any big company in modern history to justify its valuation. Can it possibly do so?

It is easy to tick off some of the pitfalls. Rivals will not stand still. Microsoft has cloud-computing ambitions; Walmart already has revenues nudging $500bn and is beefing up online. If anything happened to Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s founder and boss, the gap would be exceptionally hard to fill. But the striking thing about the company is how much of a chance it has of achieving such unprecedented goals.

Source: Corporate ambitions: Amazon, the world’s most remarkable firm, is just getting started | The Economist

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Institutional investors currently hold around $260 billion or 64.2% in Amazon [stckqut]AMZN[/stckqut] stock.

Look at its top three institutional owners. Vanguard Group Inc owns $21.44 billion in Amazon.com, Inc., which represents roughly 5.26% of the company’s market cap and approximately 8.25% of the institutional ownership. Similar statistics are true for the second largest owner, Price T Rowe Associates Inc, which owns 20,919,431 shares of the stock are valued at $17.84 billion. The third largest holder is Fmr Llc, which currently holds $16.49 billion worth of this stock and that ownership represents nearly 4.05% of its market capitalization.

At the end of 12/31/2016 reporting period, 984 institutional holders increased their position in Amazon.com by some 14,465,876 shares, 724 decreased positions by 23,425,019 and 164 held positions by 266,929,329. That puts total institutional holdings at 304,820,224 shares, according to SEC filings. The stock grabbed 219 new institutional investments totaling 3,835,622 shares while 136 institutional investors sold out their entire positions totaling 3,989,532 shares.

Multiple company employees have indulged in significant insider trading. Amazon.com, Inc. disclosed in a document filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) that Director RYDER THOMAS O has sold 4,000 shares of Amazon.com, Inc. in trading session dated Mar. 01, 2017. These shares are worth $3,408,880 and were traded at $852.22 each. The SEC filing shows that ALBERG TOM A performed a sale of 590 shares. The Director disposed these shares by way of transaction on Feb. 21, 2017. The company’s shares were given away at $850 per share worth to an income of some $501,500 on account of ALBERG TOM A.Senior Vice President, Zapolsky David, sold 503 common shares of Amazon.com, Inc. in the open market. In a transaction dated Feb. 21, 2017, the shares were put up for sale at an average price of $850, raking in a sum of $427,550. After this sale, 2,523 common shares of AMZN are directly owned by the insider, with total stake valued at $2,153,179.In the transaction dated Feb. 15, 2017, the great number of shares disposed came courtesy the CEO Worldwide Consumer; WILKE JEFFREY A disposed a total of 4,890 shares at an average price of $840.06, amounting to approximately $4,107,893. The insider now directly owns 70,653 shares worth $60,296,683.

Source: Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN): A Detailed Look at its Institutional Ownership | Post Analyst

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Shares of eCommerce giant Amazon.com, Inc [stckqut]AMZN[/stckqut] have gained more than 50% in the last one year, driven by the twin growth engines of eCommerce and cloud computing. These engines of growth are likely to continue their performance going forward making AMZN stock a good buy. Both the eCommere market and the cloud computing market will continue to grow. And now, Amazon.com Inc has another potential growth driver in its Echo devices and Alexa digital assistant.

Rising popularity of Amazon Echo.

In the last year, there has been a lot of buzz around Amazon’s Echo devices and its digital assistant Alexa. Alexa was everywhere during the CES 2017. According to a CIRP report, Echo’s brand awareness increased to 82% in the United States last year compared to 47% awareness level at the end of 2015. The rise in the product awareness was driven by strong promotion by the eCommerce giant on both conventional media and its eCommerce platform.

Echo was one of the most sold devices on Amazon.com during the holiday season last year. In a press release, Amazon had said that “Echo and Echo Dot were the best-selling products across Amazon this year, and we’re thrilled that millions of new customers will be introduced to Alexa as a result. Despite our best efforts and ramped-up production, we still had trouble keeping them in stock. From turning on Christmas lights and playing holiday music to shopping for gifts and asking for help with cookie recipes, Alexa continues to get smarter every day”.

Source: Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ:AMZN) Stock: A $10 Billion Revenue Opportunity For Amazon.com Inc

Photo by Ted Drake

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Moving into the fast lane sometimes requires a toll. Nvidia’s investors should keep that in mind.

That tab for Nvidia [stckqut]NVDA[/stckqut] is currently about 40 times forward earnings—expensive for a chip stock, given the PHLX Semiconductor Index averages about 15.6 times. It is also about 35% cheaper than what Intel just paid for Mobileye, a chief competitor of Nvidia’s in the self-driving-car space.

A buyout is unlikely for Nvidia. With a market cap north of $60 billion and a stock price that has more than doubled in the past year, Nvidia is likely out of reach for even those with the deepest pockets. That puts the onus on the company to justify that premium on its own.

It isn’t a bad bet, particularly given Nvidia’s early success in growing its business outside of the PC graphics processor segment.

That especially holds in the auto industry where the push for self-driving cars makes manufacturers hungry for the type of computing horsepower Nvidia’s chips can deliver. Autos are a small business for Nvidia now, totaling about 7% of revenue for the fiscal year ended Jan. 29. But the revenues there surged by 52% from the previous year.

Growth here will likely come from the many key partnerships the company has lined up. The past week alone saw new deals with auto-parts giant Bosch and commercial-truck manufacturer Paccar on autonomous vehicles.

Source: Nvidia’s Life in the Fast Lane Is Worth the Toll – WSJ