What happened Shares of Amazon.com (NASDAQ: AMZN) jumped 3.3% on Friday after retail sales unexpectedly climbed in September. So what Sales rose 0.7% sequentially and 13.9% year over year. Analysts had forecast a sequential decline of 0.2%. Concerns had been mounting that stubbornly high COVID-19 case counts, the end of enhanced unemployment benefits, and supply chain bottlenecks would conspire to weaken the retail industry's recovery. But consumers proved surprisingly resilient, and retailers weathered their supply chain challenges better than Wall Street expected. The American consumer is alive and well. Image source: Getty Images. As the largest e-commerce company and second-biggest retailer (by sales) in the U.S., Amazon stands to benefit from these sales trends as it enters the all-important holiday shopping season. Now what The good news supports a recent wave of optimism toward Amazon's near-term prospects. J.P. Morgan analyst Doug Anmuth believes the online retail giant's stock is poised to rally over 20% to $4,100 in the year ahead, fueled in part by an Amazon Prime price increase that could boost its profits by as much as 15%. Cowen analyst John Blackledge is likewise bullish on Amazon's shares. He thinks the stock could surge to $4,300, driven in part by younger consumers' affinity for its brand. Cowen's survey of millennial shoppers and those from their succeeding demographic, Generation Z, showed that Amazon "is now the top location for consumers to begin a product search, to research a product prior to an online or in-store purchase, and the leading platform to complete the purchase," according to Blackledge. Together, Prime's pricing power and Amazon's leading position among younger consumers should help to drive the e-commerce titan's earnings -- and, by extension, its share price -- higher in the coming years. 10 stocks we like better than AmazonWhen our award-winning analyst team has a stock tip, it can pay to listen. After all, the newsletter they have run for over a decade, Motley Fool Stock Advisor, has tripled the market.* They just revealed what they believe are the ten best stocks for investors to buy right now... and Amazon wasn't one of them! That's right -- they think these 10 stocks are even better buys. See the 10 stocks *Stock Advisor returns as of September 17, 2021 John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods Market, an Amazon subsidiary, is a member of The Motley Fool's board of directors. JPMorgan Chase is an advertising partner of The Ascent, a Motley Fool company. Joe Tenebruso has the following options: long January 2023 $2,400 calls on Amazon. The Motley Fool owns shares of and recommends Amazon. The Motley Fool recommends the following options: long January 2022 $1,920 calls on Amazon and short January 2022 $1,940 calls on Amazon. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.Source