Managing Partner, VRS (Valuation & Research Specialists)

VRS (Valuation & Research Specialists)

Managing Partner

Valuation & Research Specialists (VRS) is a boutique financial advisor with more than 17 years of experience in Corporate Valuation and Finance, and a diversified client base including some of the largest Companies in Greece.

Since 2002, VRS has completed more than 200 engagements in the areas of business valuation and financial analysis for more than 100 clients in a wide range of industries.

VRS has been honored to work with small and large private and publicly traded companies in Europe and overseas.

Boutique Financial Advisor

Equity Bottom-Up

<ul><li>Amazon.com, Inc. is a leading global technology and e-commerce conglomerate based in the United States, with a dominant and expanding presence across international markets, particularly in sectors such as cloud computing, digital streaming, and logistics.</li><li>The company’s shares have been listed on the Nasdaq Stock Market since 1997 and are included among the companies with the highest market capitalization globally.</li><li>Additionally, Amazon.com’s stock is included in a series of prominent indices, such as the Nasdaq 100, S&amp;P 500, and Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA). </li></ul>

Amazon.com, Inc. is a leading global technology and e-commerce conglomerate based in the United States, with a dominant and expanding presence across international markets, particularly in sectors such as cloud computing, digital streaming, and logistics.The company’s shares have been listed on the Nasdaq Stock Market since 1997 and are included among the companies with the highest market capitalization globally.Additionally, Amazon.com’s stock is included in a series of prominent indices, such as the Nasdaq 100, S&amp;P 500, and Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA). 

Stock Analysis - AMAZON.COM, INC. Common Stock - May 5, 2025

Independent research on the U.S. markets, Baptista Research

Baptista Research

Independent research on the U.S. markets

Baptista Research is an independent financial research house focused on the U.S. markets. We provide equity research as well as credit research reports on the top-listed U.S. companies with most of our focus on technology, consumer goods and services, automobiles, industrials, oil and gas, pharma, and healthcare. Our research has served more than 3000 institutional investors including mutual funds, hedge funds, banks, family offices, and various buy-side firms. We operate a research subscription service where institutions, as well as retail investors, can have priority access to all our research. We also have a wide distribution of our research reports across some of the top global financial platforms. Apart from equity research and credit research, we also provide advisory services with respect to mergers & acquisitions (M&A), private equity/ venture capital fundraising, valuation reports, and investment management services for corporates.
Baptista Research is owned and managed by Ishan Majumdar, an ex-Venture Capitalist/ Investment Banker, a Chartered Accountant, and a Masters’ degree holder in Management from HEC Paris. Ishan has nearly a decade of experience in Mergers and Acquisitions, Leveraged Buyouts (LBOs), Venture Capital Investing, Corporate Strategy, and Valuation in front-office roles at the likes of BNP Paribas CIB, Credit Agricole CIB, Groupe Danone, and TIW Private Equity. He has worked on and closed multiple acquisition deals, leveraged buyouts, and start-up investment transactions.

<ul><li>Amazon.com, Inc. delivered a strong performance in the first quarter of 2025, reporting $155.7 billion in revenue—a 9% year-over-year rise—and a net profit of $17.1 billion that exceeded Wall Street estimates.</li><li>Operating income also grew 20% to $18.4 billion, with trailing 12-month free cash flow hitting $25.9 billion.</li><li>The North American and international segments each posted approximately 8% revenue growth, even amid foreign exchange headwinds.</li></ul>

Amazon.com, Inc. delivered a strong performance in the first quarter of 2025, reporting $155.7 billion in revenue—a 9% year-over-year rise—and a net profit of $17.1 billion that exceeded Wall Street estimates.Operating income also grew 20% to $18.4 billion, with trailing 12-month free cash flow hitting $25.9 billion.The North American and international segments each posted approximately 8% revenue growth, even amid foreign exchange headwinds.

Amazon’s AI Push & Satellite Ambitions Are Colliding With Trade War Fears; What Could Pershing Square Be Seeing In The Company?

External broker reports(aggregated public sources), CMB International

CMB International

External broker reports(aggregated public sources)

Incorporated in Hong Kong, supported by the mainland and targeting in global market, CMB International Capital Corporation Limited (“CMBI”) is an integrated financial institution providing comprehensive and professional services. As a wholly-owned subsidiary of China Merchants Bank ("CMB"), by leveraging on the Group’s synergy and coordination in domestic and overseas markets, as well as CMB’s strong resources and outstanding social reputation, CMBI and its subsidiaries have been actively implementing diversified business strategies and set up an overall layout of main business segments including Corporate Finance, Asset Management, Wealth Management, Global Markets and Structured Finance, etc. Adhering to the philosophy of “being clients oriented and increasing our own values by the way of creating value for clients”, CMBI endeavors to provide quality and integrated financial services to institutional, corporate and individual customers both domestic and overseas including Hong Kong IPO sponsorship and underwriting, share placement and rights issue for listed companies, financial advisors, bonds issuance services, asset management, direct investment, wealth management, equity sales and trading, etc.

<ul><li>Amazon announced (2 May HKT) 1Q25 results: revenue was US$155.7bn, up 8.6% YoY (1Q24: 12.5%), inline with both our forecast and Bloomberg consensus estimate, and total operating profit was US$18.4bn, up 20% YoY, 2/5% better than our estimates/consensus, mainly driven by OPM margin beat in AWS segment, thanks to ongoing operating efficiency improvement.</li><li>Management guided for US$159.0-164.0bn revenue for 2Q25E (consensus: US$161.4bn), implying 7-11% YoY growth, and US$13.0-17.5bn operating profit (consensus: US$17.8bn) after accounting for regular impact from step-up in share-based compensation annually, and additional Project Kuiper related expenses to be booked.</li><li>We lower 2025-2027E revenue/OP forecast by 0.5- 0.8%/3.2-5.1% to factor in additional Kuiper expenses, and our target price is lowered by 8% to US$247.0 (was US$268.0), based on 18.3x EV/EBITDA (was 18.5x), inline with the two-year trading average. </li></ul><p><em>Content is external broker report sourced from online content aggregator through publicly available sources and is displayed below for general informational purposes only. Refer full disclaimer below.</em></p>

Amazon announced (2 May HKT) 1Q25 results: revenue was US$155.7bn, up 8.6% YoY (1Q24: 12.5%), inline with both our forecast and Bloomberg consensus estimate, and total operating profit was US$18.4bn, up 20% YoY, 2/5% better than our estimates/consensus, mainly driven by OPM margin beat in AWS segment, thanks to ongoing operating efficiency improvement.Management guided for US$159.0-164.0bn revenue for 2Q25E (consensus: US$161.4bn), implying 7-11% YoY growth, and US$13.0-17.5bn operating profit (consensus: US$17.8bn) after accounting for regular impact from step-up in share-based compensation annually, and additional Project Kuiper related expenses to be booked.We lower 2025-2027E revenue/OP forecast by 0.5- 0.8%/3.2-5.1% to factor in additional Kuiper expenses, and our target price is lowered by 8% to US$247.0 (was US$268.0), based on 18.3x EV/EBITDA (was 18.5x), inline with the two-year trading average. Content is external broker report sourced from online content aggregator through publicly available sources and is displayed below for general informational purposes only. Refer full disclaimer below.

Amazon (AMZN US) - 1Q earnings beat; pace of earnings growth to enter a healthy stage

Mostly Borrowed Ideas Deep Dives, MBI Deep Dives

MBI Deep Dives

Mostly Borrowed Ideas Deep Dives

MBI is the abbreviation for “Mostly Borrowed Ideas”. Why “Mostly Borrowed Ideas?” As a generalist, I do not have a background in any particular sector. I enjoy navigating across industries, businesses, and countries to learn, understand, and connect the dots. In any case, most ideas and innovations are incremental in nature. Very few of us are smart enough to come up with truly original or groundbreaking ideas. I am Abdullah Al-Rezwan. I was born and brought up in Bangladesh. I went to University of Dhaka for my undergrad and majored in Finance. After working three and half years in Equity Research (Sell-side) covering Financial Sector in Bangladesh, I left Bangladesh to pursue my MBA in the US. I graduated within top 10% of the class from Cornell University's two-year MBA program and worked on the buy-side following my graduation. During my time at Cornell, I won two stock pitch competitions and also became finalists in four other competitions. I thoroughly enjoyed my stint as a generalist in the US large cap team at Madison Investments and covered a wide range of companies from UnitedHealth to Amazon and Boeing before US immigration reality paused my career in investment management. As my work authorization expired, I moved to Canada in January, 2021. Then in early 2022, I was able to return to the US.

<ul><li>While Amazon’s 3P business usually grows faster than 1P, both 1P and 3P retail business grew at similar rate in 1Q’25.</li><li>Ads revenue continued its momentum at 19% growth YoY which was higher than both Google and Meta.</li><li>After growing at ~19% YoY for the last three consecutive quarters, AWS growth decelerated this quarter to 17%.</li></ul>

While Amazon’s 3P business usually grows faster than 1P, both 1P and 3P retail business grew at similar rate in 1Q’25.Ads revenue continued its momentum at 19% growth YoY which was higher than both Google and Meta.After growing at ~19% YoY for the last three consecutive quarters, AWS growth decelerated this quarter to 17%.

Head of Research, IPOs & Placements, Aequitas Research

Sumeet Singh

Head of Research, IPOs & Placements

IPOs and Placements coverage across Asia Pacific

Aequitas Research

We cover all listing across the Asia Pacific along with follow-up placements. As of Dec 2020, our team had covered 539 IPOs with a hit rate of 73.5% and 685 placements with a hit rate of 66.8%.

We combine fundamental bottom-up views with our proprietary quantitative framework to provide a holistic coverage across new listings and placements. Our coverage includes pre-IPO notes before the deal is launched, follow-up analysis once the deal is live and post-listing trading analysis as well.

Equity Capital Markets

<ul>
<li>
<a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/xero-ltd" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:390:1" rel="noopener">Xero Ltd (XRO AU)</a>  plans to raise around US$1.2bn via an institutional placement to partly fund the US$2.5bn acquisition for Melio.</li>
<li>The US market has been a growth dampener for Xero for a while. The acquisition is large but might not be a game changer.</li>
<li>In this note, we will talk about the deal dynamics and run the deal through our ECM framework.</li>
</ul>



Xero Ltd (XRO AU)  plans to raise around US$1.2bn via an institutional placement to partly fund the US$2.5bn acquisition for Melio.
The US market has been a growth dampener for Xero for a while. The acquisition is large but might not be a game changer.
In this note, we will talk about the deal dynamics and run the deal through our ECM framework.


Xero US1.2bn Placement - Trying to Jump Start US, Again. Might Not Be a Game Changer.

United States

Amazon.com, Inc. is an online retailer that offers a wide range of products. The Company's products include books, music, videotapes, computers, electronics, home and garden, and numerous other products.  Amazon offers personalized shopping services, Web-based credit card payment, and direct shipping to customers.

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Amazon.com Inc (AMZN US)

Stock Analysis - AMAZON.COM, INC. Common Stock - May 5, 2025

Amazon.com, Inc. is a leading global technology and e-commerce conglomerate based in the United States, with a dominant and expanding presence...

VRS (Valuation & Research Specialists)

Amazon’s AI Push & Satellite Ambitions Are Colliding With Trade War Fears; What Could Pershing Square Be Seeing In The Company?

Amazon.com, Inc. delivered a strong performance in the first quarter of 2025, reporting $155.7 billion in revenue—a 9% year-over-year rise—and a...

Baptista Research

Amazon (AMZN US) - 1Q earnings beat; pace of earnings growth to enter a healthy stage

We are looking for 18% YoY growth in OP in 2025E aided by optimization in cost to serve and improvement in scale effect, which we believe could be...

CMB International

Amazon 1Q'25 Update

While Amazon’s 3P business usually grows faster than 1P, both 1P and 3P retail business grew at similar rate in 1Q’25. Ads revenue continued its...

MBI Deep Dives

Xero US1.2bn Placement - Trying to Jump Start US, Again. Might Not Be a Game Changer.

Xero Ltd (XRO AU) plans to raise around US$1.2bn via an institutional placement to partly fund the US$2.5bn acquisition for Melio.

Sumeet Singh

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