BMO Capital Markets predicts that Amazon.com’s stock price will surge 23 percent this year to near $800 billion value
"We believe the emergence of Amazon's advertising business can support both margin and multiple expansion and could be a greater catalyst for the shares if management shares more data points like it did for Amazon Web Services," CNBC.com cited BMO analyst Daniel Salmon as writing. "The end result is greater confidence in the company's advertising opportunity and an increase in our estimates."
BMO raised its price target to $1,600 from $1,200, the highest 12-month forecast on the e-commerce company of any brokerage on Wall Street.
The target represents a 23 percent gain from Friday's close of $1,305.20. Amazon's stock price was trading near midday Tuesday at $1,326.94.
The analyst's new price target implies a market cap of $771 billion given the current level of common stock, CNBC explained.
Meanwhile, Bloomberg reported that the Seattle online titan is now focusing on virtual-reality technology.
Companies are racing to be the first to get lightweight augmented reality glasses into consumers’ hands. Amazon, which pioneered the smart speaker, hasn’t said much publicly about AR or VR.
But a person familiar with the company’s thinking said that it’s far more likely to choose augmented reality if it makes a headset. Amazon is actively exploring headset technologies, though a launch may be years away, another person said.
(Newsmax wire services and Reuters and Bloomberg contributed to this report).