Amazon shares jump ahead of Prime Day


Amazon shares rose by 4.8 percent on Monday ahead of the Tuesday start of the online retail giant's two-day Prime Day sale event. Amazon won't disclose the take for the annual event, which was delayed this year due to the coronavirus crisis, but some analysts expect $10 billion in sales over the two days. The gains by Amazon and fellow tech-giant Apple fueled a tech surge that lifted the tech-heavy Nasdaq by 2.6 percent on Monday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 also rose, by 0.9 percent and 1.6 percent, respectively. U.S. stock index futures were mixed several hours before the opening bell on Tuesday as investors awaited the kickoff of earnings season and fresh news on coronavirus stimulus talks in Washington.
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Harold Maass is a contributing editor at The Week. He has been writing for The Week since the 2001 debut of the U.S. print edition and served as editor of TheWeek.com when it launched in 2008. Harold started his career as a newspaper reporter in South Florida and Haiti. He has previously worked for a variety of news outlets, including The Miami Herald, ABC News and Fox News, and for several years wrote a daily roundup of financial news for The Week and Yahoo Finance.
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