Quick Read

• Amazon (AMZN) stock received a price target raise to $280 from $225 by Raymond James after Q1 2026 earnings.

• Raymond James upgraded Amazon based on major AI partnerships and agentic tooling reinforcing AWS as the central platform for enterprise AI commercialization, despite near-term pressure from $200B projected CapEx spending in fiscal 2026.

• The analyst who called NVIDIA in 2010 just named his top 10 stocks and Amazon wasn’t one of them. Get them here FREE.

Raymond James lifted its price target on Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) stock to $280 from $225, maintaining its Outperform rating. The firm argues that major artificial intelligence (AI) partnerships and expanding agentic capabilities are reinforcing Amazon Web Services (AWS) as the key platform for enterprise and consumer AI commercialization. For long-term investors, the revised outlook warrants a closer look at a cloud franchise that may be Wall Street’s most under-discussed AI beneficiary.

The price target raise follows yesterday’s avalanche of 14-plus firms lifting their AMZN stock price targets after the Q1 2026 earnings report. That action puts Raymond James firmly inside an emerging consensus.

The Analyst’s Case

Raymond James acknowledges that AWS posted slightly softer-than-expected 28% growth, yet views the underlying fundamentals as improving. The firm believes major AI partnerships and agentic tooling are lifting remaining performance obligations (RPO) expectations and entrenching AWS at the center of AI commercialization.

The analyst who called NVIDIA in 2010 just named his top 10 stocks and Amazon wasn’t one of them. Get them here FREE.

The supporting wins are concrete. OpenAI committed to roughly 2 GW of Trainium capacity beginning in 2027, Anthropic secured up to 5 GW of Trainium chips, and Amazon’s chips business topped a $20 billion annual run rate with triple-digit year-over-year (YoY) growth.

Company Snapshot

Amazon’s Q1 2026 results showed revenue of $181.52 billion, up 17% YoY, with EPS of $2.78 versus a $1.73 estimate. Currency-neutral growth accelerated to 15%, the highest in 3.5 years, while backlog hit a record $364 billion before Anthropic commitments.

AWS revenue reached $37.59 billion, the fastest growth in 15 quarters, although operating margin slipped to 38% from 40% YoY as AI infrastructure spending ramps. Amazon CEO Andy Jassy stated, “We’re in the middle of some of the biggest inflections of our lifetime, we’re well positioned to lead.”