E-commerce giant Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) announced a hiring freeze for corporate positions in its retail business segment, the New York Times reported. The move comes amid a slowdown in online sales.
Several retail giants, including Amazon, expanded massively during the pandemic years to capture the huge demand for online shopping. They are now downsizing their extra capacity and cutting costs amid rising fears of an economic slowdown.
The hiring pause is applicable until the end of the year to the Worldwide Amazon Stores division and excludes its cloud business or its warehousing network.
According to a Wall Street Journal report, Amazon has lowered its employee count by 100,000 year-to-date and had 1.5 million workers as of June 30, including full- and part-time workers.
Is Amazon Stock a Buy, Sell, or Hold?
Yesterday, JPMorgan (NYSE:JPM) analyst Doug Anmuth reiterated a Buy rating on Amazon stock.
For Anmuth, Amazon continues to be a “favorite name by a wide margin.” The analyst’s optimism is based on expectations that increased revenue growth, higher margins, and reduced capital expenditure will boost cash flows in 2023.
The rest of the Street is also optimistic about the stock. Overall, AMZN stock commands a Strong Buy consensus rating based on 35 Buys and one Hold. Amazon’s average price target of $171.94 implies 41.99% upside potential from current levels.
Further, TipRanks’ Stock Investors tool shows that investors currently have a positive stance on Amazon, with 1.1% of investors on TipRanks increasing their exposure to AMZN stock over the past 30 days.
Conclusion
Amazon, like its tech peers such as Meta Platforms Inc. (NASDAQ:META), is steadily looking at cost control initiatives in preparation for the slowdown in the economy.
Investors will get more insights when Amazon reports its third-quarter FY2023 results on October 27.
