Amazon announces shock £4.56m loss in second quarter

Online retail giant Amazon made a loss of £4.56m in the second quarter of the year as it seeks to diversify away from traditional warehousing into a wider technology strategy.

The retailer continues to spend billions of dollars on digital content rights and developing its Kindle tablet range, cloud drive service, digital download software and video streaming.

However, its latest performance was below analysts’ forecast sales increase of 12 – 24 per cent.

Founder and Chief Executive Jeff Bezoz remained confident that his company was heading in the right direction as its Kindle products outstripped sales of traditional books last year.

He said: “This past quarter, our top 10 selling items worldwide were all digital products - Kindles, Kindle Fire HDs, accessories and digital content.”

Amazon shares fell by two per cent on the news.

Source: Michael Somerville