MW Amazon's stock could face this sneaky AI risk

By Christine Ji

Some on Wall Street think agentic commerce could help Amazon's business, but a Raymond James analyst worries the trend could eat into the company's dominance

More automation in the shopping process could reduce the need for consumers to browse Amazon's website manually, potentially bypassing search ads.

Amazon.com has struggled to convince investors that it's a top artificial-intelligence player among the Big Tech names, and even bulls acknowledge that there are challenges ahead of the company.

While much of the lackluster enthusiasm surrounding Amazon's( AMZN) stock has been due to fears of market-share losses for Amazon Web Services, Raymond James has highlighted another AI challenge that the company faces - this time, in its retail business.

The rise of "agentic commerce," where AI agents autonomously handle shopping and checkout for consumers, could deal a disruptive blow to Amazon's e-commerce marketplace, according to analyst Josh Beck. In a Thursday note, Beck lowered his price target on the stock to $260 from $275, although he maintained an outperform rating.

More automation in the shopping process could reduce the need for consumers to browse Amazon's website manually, potentially bypassing search ads and sponsored listings that drive Amazon's advertising business. This would reduce the amount of first-party data Amazon can collect, which informs how it targets advertising and its performance across not only e-commerce but also Prime Video and third-party apps.

Also read: Amazon's stock could be supercharged by this growing business

Currently, Amazon dominates the "purchase funnel," meaning that around 50% of shoppers start their product search directly on Amazon, Beck wrote. If more consumers initiated their searches through third-party AI agents, traffic would fall and Amazon might have to pay AI platforms a commission to drive transactions to its site, according to Beck.

If the portion of shoppers starting their journey on Amazon slips to 45% because of AI agents, Beck warns that core retail growth could come in 1 percentage point below current consensus estimates for 2026. Wall Street currently forecasts 8% growth.

Some analysts, such as Bank of America's Justin Post, have argued that Amazon could become a winner in the agentic-commerce era by expanding on its in-house AI technology. Amazon has developed AI tools for shopping such as Rufus and Alexa+ to play into this trend on its own terms. Post wrote in a note earlier this week that Amazon could turn Rufus into a fully agentic shopper in the future, and could integrate advertising into both Rufus and Alexa+.

The implications of agentic shopping on Amazon aren't entirely clear yet. Beck called it a "key near-term swing factor" that could pose a "longer-term ecosystem risk" to Amazon. He notes that if successful, Amazon's internal agents could actually be a tailwind by encouraging shoppers to build larger "basket sizes." Indeed, Amazon has shared that users of Rufus and Alexa+ are more engaged and likely to make a purchase. However, despite the early headway, Beck believes "specific monetization segmentation and momentum remains broadly opaque."

Read: Amazon and these four tech stocks can benefit most from the next AI wave, according to Bank of America

The uncertainty remains another challenge for Amazon, which was the worst-performing "Magnificent Seven" stock in 2025 but is one of only two of that group in positive territory to start 2026.

-Christine Ji

This content was created by MarketWatch, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. MarketWatch is published independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

January 15, 2026 09:47 ET (14:47 GMT)

Copyright (c) 2026 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.