Amazon's AWS Margin Expansion Accelerates: More Upside for the Stock?

Core Insights - Amazon's cloud segment, AWS, showed strong margin performance in Q3 2025, with an operating income of $11.4 billion on revenues of $33 billion, resulting in a 34.6% operating margin, indicating robust demand and effective cost management [2][10] - AWS's trailing 12-month operating margin stabilized at 35.9% after previous compression due to AI investments, supported by the scaling of custom silicon strategy and significant revenue growth from Trainium2 chips [3] - AWS revenue growth accelerated to 20% year-over-year, adding $2.1 billion sequentially, reaching a $132 billion annualized run rate, with a substantial $200 billion backlog providing multi-year revenue visibility [4] Innovations and Competitive Position - The December re:Invent conference introduced innovations like Trainium3 UltraServers and Graviton5 processors, enhancing compute performance and energy efficiency, which bolster cost optimization for enterprise customers [5] - AWS's ability to monetize capacity investments while maintaining mid-30% margins, combined with accelerating growth and visible long-term demand, supports a positive stock outlook [6] Competitive Landscape - Microsoft’s Intelligent Cloud segment achieved a 43% operating margin in Q1 FY2026, with Azure revenue growth of 40%, showcasing its ability to balance expansion and margin discipline [7] - Alphabet's Google Cloud reported a 23.7% operating margin in Q3 2025, up from 17.1% the previous year, with operating income surging 85% year-over-year, indicating a strong margin improvement trajectory [7] Stock Performance and Valuation - Amazon shares returned 9.2% over the past six months, outperforming the Zacks Internet – Commerce industry and the Zacks Retail-Wholesale sector [8] - The Zacks Consensus Estimate for Amazon's 2026 earnings is $7.85 per share, reflecting a 9.46% increase from the previous year [11] - Amazon's stock appears overvalued with a forward P/E ratio of 31.16X compared to the industry average of 25.64X, indicating a Value Score of D [12]