April 23, 2008 2:03 PM PDT

Amazon first quarter beats Wall Street projections

Posted by Dawn Kawamoto

Amazon.com posted Wednesday stronger than expected first quarter results, in part driven by strong sales in its electronics and general merchandise categories.

The online retailing giant also issued a forecast for the current quarter and year that shows greater strength than Wall Street's current estimates.

Shares of Amazon, however, were down roughly 4 percent in after-hours trading to $77.77 a share.

During the first quarter, Amazon generated net income of 34 cents a share to $143 million, up 30 percent compared with the previous year. Revenues jumped 37 percent to $4.13 billion in the quarter, verses the same period a year ago.

Wall Street was expecting the company to report earnings of 32 cents a share on revenues of $4.08 billion, according to Thomson Reuters.

The online retailer got a large leg up from its worldwide electronics and general merchandise sales, which soared 56 percent to $1.48 billion in the quarter, compared with year ago figures.

Amazon's global media sales rose a sharp 28 percent to $2.54 billion in the quarter, compared with last year.

"Our sales growth this quarter was driven by low prices and millions of in-stock items available for immediate shipment," Jeff Bezos, Amazon's chief executive, said in a statement. "We're grateful to our customers."

And in forecasting its second quarter and year-end, Amazon expects to generate greater revenues or stronger earnings than a consensus of analysts, according to Thomson Reuters, which tracks analysts projections.

Although Wall Street expects Amazon to post revenues of $3.84 billion in the second quarter, Amazon gave guidance it expects to exceed that level - with expectations of generating between approximately $3.88 billion to $4.1 billion.

And while analysts expect Amazon to post operating income of $125.3 million in the quarter, the company said it expects to do between $120 million to $160 million.

The online retailing giant expects its year-end operating income will outstrip current year-end estimates, saying it expects to raise between $740 million to $940 million in operating income. Wall Street had been expecting Amazon to do $662.3 million for the year.

And on the revenue front, Amazon expects to generate $19.1 billion to $20 billion, compared with Wall Street's projections of $19.3 billion.