amazon.com Inc.

AMAZON.COM INC., $384.24, symbol AMZN on Nasdaq, has expanded its AmazonFresh same-day grocery delivery service to San Francisco. The move follows the launch of the service in Los Angeles in June 2013. AmazonFresh has also been available in the company’s hometown of Seattle for some time. AmazonFresh promises same-day or early morning delivery of over 500,000 items, including groceries and food from specialty shops. Delivery is free on orders over $35 if the customer pays a yearly $299 subscription fee. The fee also includes the benefits of Amazon’s Prime service, such as free two-day shipping on most other products sold on Amazon.com. AmazonFresh may help the company achieve its goal of same-day delivery of all its products. In addition to groceries, AmazonFresh trucks will deliver a range of toys, electronics and household goods. Eventually, they could let the company ship to customers directly and do away with the services of UPS or FedEx in many markets. The trucks could also let Amazon pick up returns from customers, again cutting out the courier companies and speeding up service....

Exchange traded funds (ETFs) are set up to mirror the performance of a stock-market index or subindex. They hold a more or less fixed selection of securities that represent the holdings that go into the calculation of the index or sub-index.

ETFs trade on stock exchanges, just like stocks....

AMAZON.COM $395.96 (Nasdaq symbol AMZN; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk) (206-266-1000; www.amazon.com; Shares outstanding: 457.7 million; Market cap: $177.4 billion; No dividends paid) has expanded its AmazonFresh same-day grocery delivery service to San Francisco. The move follows the launch of the service in Los Angeles in June 2013. AmazonFresh has also been available in the company’s hometown of Seattle for some time.

AmazonFresh promises same-day or early morning delivery of over 500,000 items, including groceries and food from specialty shops. Delivery is free on all orders over $35 if the customer pays a yearly $299 subscription fee. The fee also includes the benefits of Amazon’s Prime service, such as free two-day shipping on most of the other products sold on Amazon.com.

AmazonFresh may help the company achieve its goal of same-day delivery of all its products. In addition to groceries, AmazonFresh trucks will deliver a range of toys, electronics and household goods. Eventually, these trucks could let the company ship to customers directly and do away with the services of UPS or FedEx in many markets. The trucks could also let Amazon pick up returns from customers, again cutting out the courier companies and speeding up service.
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The p/e ratio—the ratio of a stock’s price per share to its earnings per share—is an extremely crude way to measure investment value. It’s a mistake to buy a stock just because it has a low p/e. At times, it can also be a mistake to stay out of a stock just because of a high p/e. In either case, of course, you need to look more closely and try to figure out why the p/e is high or low. Only then can you begin to make an informed decision. Some investors zero in on low-p/e stocks—price under 10.0 times earnings, say. They make some great buys that way, but this rule can also lure them into investment minefields. Often, stocks have low p/e’s because informed investors recognize their earnings are highly uncertain or headed way down. Buying these stocks is never a bargain when the bad news is not yet widely known. When the bad news hits the front pages because the company’s earnings have collapsed, however, that can be a good time to buy. At that time the p/e is way up, because the “e” is much lower....

GOOGLE INC., $1,011.41, Nasdaq symbol GOOG, jumped 14% on Friday after the company reported better-than-expected earnings and revenue. In the three months ended September 30, 2013, earnings rose 23.3%, to $3.6 billion from $3.0 billion a year earlier. Due to more shares outstanding, earnings per share rose at a slower rate of 21.1%, to $10.74 from $8.87....

BELLATRIX EXPLORATION LTD., $8.14, symbol BXE on Toronto, is buying Angle Energy (symbol NGL on Toronto) for $576 million in cash and shares. Angle currently produces 10,500 barrels of oil equivalent a day (58% oil and 42% natural gas) in Alberta. Bellatrix’s output is 22,500 barrels a day, so they will have combined daily production of 33,000 barrels. The purchase also increases Bellatrix’s inventory of drilling targets by 500, to over 2,000, and doubles its undeveloped land base to over 400,000 acres. The company now expects to end 2013 with production as high as 40,000 barrels a day, up from 30,000 to 31,000 before the Angle acquisition. It also expects Angle to immediately add to its cash flow per share....

AMAZON.COM INC., $310.89, symbol AMZN on Nasdaq, won a $600-million deal to build a cloud computing service for the U.S Central Intelligence Agency early this year. This system would let the CIA more effectively connect with the broader intelligence community. The project will run over four years. However, the CIA has traditionally awarded many of its big computing contracts to IBM (New York symbol IBM), a recommendation of our Wall Street Stock Forecaster newsletter. IBM protested the awarding of this deal to Amazon, and the U.S. Government Accountability Office recommended that the CIA reopen negotiations. Immediately afterward, Amazon filed a complaint, which then led to a hearing on Monday of this week....

MONSANTO CO., $105.63, New York symbol MON, is buying Climate Corp., a private company that specializes in weather forecasting software and climate models. These products help farmers decide when to plant their crops in order to maximize their harvests. This technology will also help Monsanto develop genetically engineered seeds for specific regions and weather conditions. The company will pay $930 million for Climate Corp. when the deal closes in the next few weeks. Meanwhile, Monsanto earned $2.5 billion, or $4.60 a share, in its 2013 fiscal year, which ended August 31, 2013. That’s up 21.4% from $2.0 billion, or $3.79 a share, in 2012....

AMAZON.COM INC., $316.01, symbol AMZN on Nasdaq, has unveiled two new versions of its Kindle tablet computer, as the company aims to increase its small share of the highly competitive tablet market. Amazon has an estimated 5% of the U.S. tablet market, compared to 51% for the Apple iPad and 19% for Samsung. The company will continue to offer its lower-end Kindle Fire HD, with a seven-inch screen, for $139. However, it is now introducing a new seven-inch Kindle Fire HDX starting at $229 and an 8.9-inch Kindle Fire HDX starting at $379....

AMAZON.COM $312.03 (Nasdaq symbol AMZN; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk) (206- 266-1000; www.amazon.com; Shares outstanding: 456.9 million; Market cap: $139.0 billion; No dividends paid) has entered into a partnership with magazine publisher Condé Nast.

For a fee, Amazon will handle print and digital subscriptions for seven of Condé Nast’s publications, including Vogue, Golf Digest and Wired.

For Amazon, the deal offers an opportunity to sell magazine subscriptions to its more than 200 million customers and crosssell goods to Condé Nast subscribers....