E-commerce giant Amazon has reported a $8.1bn (5.8bn) profit in the first three months of 2021 - more than three times what it was this time last year.

The business, along with many other in the sector, has thrived during lockdowns as many bricks and mortar shops were forced to close and customers turned to online shopping.

Since the start of the pandemic, Amazon has reported four quarterly profit records and hopes online shopping habits will stick.

For the first three months of 2021, revenues jumped 44 per cent to $108.5bn (£77bn). Sales within it's ad business rose 77 per cent, while its cloud computing business grew by 32 per cent.

"Two of our kids are now 10 and 15 years old — and after years of being nurtured, they're growing up fast and coming into their own," said Jeff Bezos, Amazon founder and CEO.

"As Prime Video turns 10, over 175 million Prime members have streamed shows and movies in the past year, and streaming hours are up more than 70 per cent year over year.

"In just 15 years, AWS has become a $54 billion annual sales run rate business competing against the world's largest technology companies."

Moving forward, Amazon said it expected sales volumes to continue even as countries began to reopen. It forcasted revenues of between $110bn and $116bn for the current quarter.

After the announcement, shares rose around three per cent in after-hours trading. Amazon's share price has gained about 45 per cent in the last 12 months alone.