Amazon.com announced financial results on Wednesday for its second quarter ended June 30, 2008. Net sales increased 41% to $4.06 billion in the second quarter, compared with $2.89 billion in second quarter 2007. Excluding the $0.18 billion favorable impact from year-over-year changes in foreign exchange rates throughout the quarter, net sales grew 35% compared with second quarter 2007. Net income increased 102% to $158 million in the second quarter compared with net income of $78 million in second quarter 2007.

"Customers continue to take advantage of our low prices, free shipping and Amazon Prime," said Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon.com. "Amazon Prime membership costs less than a tank of gas - more and more customers are joining the program and enjoying its benefits."

Amazon.com said Worldwide Media sales grew 31% to $2.41 billion in second quarter 2008, compared with $1.83 billion in second quarter 2007. Worldwide Electronics & Other General Merchandise sales grew 58% to $1.53 billion in second quarter 2008, compared with $0.97 billion in second quarter 2007, and increased to 38% of worldwide net sales compared with 34%.

North America segment sales, representing the Company's U.S. and Canadian sites, were $2.17 billion, up 35% from second quarter 2007. International segment sales, representing the Company's U.K., German, Japanese, French and Chinese sites, were $1.89 billion, up 47% from second quarter 2007, and increased to 47% of worldwide net sales compared with 45%. Excluding the favorable impact from year-over-year changes in foreign exchange rates throughout the quarter, International sales grew 34%.

Interestingly, the company said over 400,000 developers have registered to use Amazon Web Services (AWS), up more than 30,000 from last quarter.

Amazon.com held a conference call with analysts after earnings were released. SeekingAlpha published a transcript of the call.

During the call, the company said the percentage of third-party units was 29%, which is flat with last year. "Keep in mind that our unit growth did accelerate in total so our unit growth was 32%. Also keep in mind or another data point is our third party units did grow faster then our retail units this quarter. So again, we're still seeing very, very good growth there. A couple of things to think about the active seller accounts if you will, are up 18% year-over-year that compares to a year ago where they're up 11%. We've had several quarters where we've seen accelerated growth of active seller accounts. So again we think that the business looks good. It's really not impacting the guidance as we think about it. We're very positive about both our retail business and our third party business. Ultimately the customer will decide what units they buy and we're trying to make the experience better for customers and for sellers."

Amazon.com CEO Jeff Bezos answered a question about the quality of third-party sellers, and mentioned the Fulfillment By Amazon program (see page 9 of the SeekingAlpha transcript).