[hacknat]

Umm... What?

The 10-Q you just posted says AMZN pulled in $4 Billion in cash equivalents for the quarter which is almost double what they did the last equivalent quarter. It also says they have $8 billion in the last 6 month period whereas the year before they had $5 billion in the same 6 month period.

My point wasn't that they are making a profit, my point is that they are pumping enormous amounts of money into their own infrastructure. Looks at the capital investments section of the report.

[hncommenter13]

I'm not sure where you're looking. Page 3, Consolidated Statements of Cash Flows. Last 12 months ended 6/30/2013, $4.5B CFO, ($5.8B) CFI, $2.8B CFF. Without issuing debt, their net cash would have decreased.

You are essentially arguing that the investment expenditures will fade over time, leaving Amazon strongly free-cash-flow positive.

I am saying that, at present, the only reason they generate cash is that they issued debt, and that we need to look carefully at the nature of the cash expenditures on investments, as I believe many will likely continue (and that some of them are really recharacterized operating expenses).

The question is whether those investment expenses are truly optional/one-time. Neither of us knows for sure.