Kindle fires Amazon profits

Amazon.com posted first-quarter profits that beat analysts’ estimates and boosted the company’s stock in extended trading.

The online commerce giant said its Kindle Fire tablet computer was its best-selling item and helped lift revenue from digital movies and books.

Amazon chief financial officer Tom Szkutak told analysts that media sales were up, particularly in North America, thanks in part to the Kindle Fire, which is sold exclusively in the US.

“Customers are buying a lot of content,” he said. “You’re seeing that accelerate.”

Amazon’s surprisingly good January-March quarter – which helped drive its stock up 14% in after-market trading – came on the heels of a report from market tracker comScore Inc. that said the Kindle Fire had grabbed more than half of the US market for Android-based tablet computers in February, just months after its November 15 launch.

For the company as a whole, net income declined to $130m (€99m), or 28 cents per share, from $201m or 44 cents per share, a year ago. That was still better than the 6 cents per share of profit expected by analysts polled by FactSet.