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Bloomberg
Amazon.com Inc captured the bulk of online spending during the first 24 hours of its Prime Day event, showing that customers continue to flock to the site for deals despite competing discounts offered by Walmart Inc, EBay Inc and Best Buy.
Online shoppers spent more than 10 times as much money on Amazon in the first day than they did on Walmart and EBay combined, according to e-commerce research company Edison Trends. Sales in the first 24 hours were up 53 percent compared to the same period of last year’s Prime Day, Edison said.
Amazon said sales over the two days this year surpassed those on Black Friday and Cyber Monday combined. The Seattle-based company launched Prime Day in 2015 to lure new Prime members, who pay monthly or annual fees for shipping discounts and other perks. Prime members spend more than twice as much on the site each year than non-Prime members, according to Consumer Intelligence Research Partners.
That makes a day of discounts worth it for Amazon to draw more spending through the year.