[dragontamer]

Hmmm...

>> Jeff Bezos’s Amazon operated on extremely tight margins and was not profitable

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1018724/000119312509...

Amazon made $645 million net profit in 2008, $476 net profit in 2007, and $190 million in 2006.

Where did this myth of "Amazon doesn't make profits" come from? Why are people seemingly unable to check publicly shared historical 10k and fact-check themselves before making statements like this?

[lkbm]

Yeah, the 2008 number is wrong, but the meme comes from earlier. Its first profitable quarter was Q4 2001, three years after IPO, and it's first profitable year was 2003, six years after IPO.[0] This seems like a long time, especially for the late nineties/early 2000s. (Though tbh, IPO three years after founding feels early to me too.)

Additionally, I seem to recall that they talked this up. Not "we're working on becoming profitable" but instead "We plan to continue losing money for several years. Deal with it."

I believe that prior to 2016, any profitable years were pretty much entirely thanks to Q4, and they were pretty small for its size[1]. A profitable year is good, but three quarters of losses each year will stand out. Sure, they're retail, but they're also tech. Sky high margins are expected year-round.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Amazon

[1] https://qz.com/1925043/the-days-of-amazons-profit-struggles-...

[gowld]

Amazon was unprofitable because they poured all their opearating profits into growth projects, not because they were subsidizing operations with investment.

Like many retailers, the business is seasonal and Q4 has more shopping. This is modeled as part of the business. We don't say lawn care businesses are unstable because they do most work in the summer.

[da_chicken]

From what I remember, Amazon's strategy early on was to take as much revenue as it could and invest it back into itself. It intentionally ran in the red to try to grow faster.