Wall Street is ecstatic about Amazon's blowout quarter (AMZN)

Amazon shares are up nearly 10% Friday afternoon, after delivering a solid beat-and-raise quarter.

There were a lot of things to like about this quarter: growing profitability, rapid growth of Amazon Web Services, and expansion of its international business.

As expected, Wall Street is all over Amazon with glowing notes about its business. 

Here's a round-up of what analysts are saying about Amazon's strong earnings and its $300 billion empire:

Disclosure: Jeff Bezos is an investor in Business Insider through his personal investment company Bezos Expeditions.

Rating: Outperform

Price Target: $800 (raise from $715)

Comment: "AMZN is generating Accelerating Revenue Growth & Record High Margins. And we believe these trends to be sustainable, because: a) Amazon’s two key end-markets (Retail and Cloud Computing) are only 10% penetrated; b) the Competitive Moats around AMZN are getting deeper due in part to sheer scale; and c) Amazon’s execution is excellent. If Q4 was the Correction Buying AMZN Quarter, then Q1 is the Inflection Buying AMZN Quarter. AMZN remains our #1 Long in the ‘Net Sector."

Rating: Buy

Price Target: $810 (raise from $685)

Comment: "But Amazon reminded us who is King of the eCommerce Jungle. Revenue of $29.1b accelerated to 29% YoY growth (ex-FX), gross margin reached a record high 35.2% and CSOI margin of 5.7% was the highest since 3Q09. This solid performance came from strength among Prime users, with international Prime users driving accelerating sales."

Rating: Overweight

Price Target: $800

Comment: "The bottom line: years of investment in Prime, fulfillment, AWS and international growth are yielding accelerating unit growth, substantial profit, and continued long-term opportunities for Amazon. We are increasingly confident in our EBITDA forecasts, which were 18% ahead of the Street prior to the Q1 earnings release. Margin expansion was driven by a surprise profitability in international, continued margin expansion in North America, and 1,000bps of y/y margin expansion at AWS."

Rating: Buy

Price Target: $865 (raise from $775)

Comment: "Amazon reported another solid quarter with nice acceleration in revenue and unit growth. Guidance came in largely in-line with expectations as the company remains in investment mode. We believe AMZN should be a core eCommerce holding as it still has plenty of growth opportunities ahead. The company remains one of the best large-cap ideas in our coverage universe, with one of the most significant moats."

Rating: Buy

Price Target: $785 (raise from $720)

Comment: "In early 2016, investors have feared multiple drivers of a renewed investment cycle by Amazon (Q4's fulfilment cost over-runs; logistics, content, India). However, counter to fears/noise, Amazon's strong Q1 CSOI result (& forward guide) should help alleviate investor concerns around the impacts stemming from any forward investments (which we believe will be reasonable, albeit potentially volatile quarter-to-quarter) within the context of Amazon's sizeable revenue opportunities (backdrop of both eCommerce & cloud computing)."

See Also:

• Amazon plans to 'significantly' increase investment in video as it goes to war with Netflix
• Amazon crushes earnings, stock goes crazy
• An overlooked part of Amazon will be in the spotlight when the company reports earnings

SEE ALSO: Here's what Wall Street is saying about Yahoo's weak earnings and shrinking core business