[Rimpinths]

There was an interesting article on Seeking Alpha a few months ago comparing Wal-Mart with Amazon at the same stage of growth (i.e. comparable level of overall revenue and revenue growth). He compared Wal-Mart in 1990-92 and Amazon in 2010-12:

http://seekingalpha.com/article/1547622-is-amazon-com-the-ne...

He noted that Wal-Mart had about the same levels of CapEx spending (~4%), yet it was also highly profitable by that point. Amazon isn't spending any more on CapEx than Wal-Mart was at the same stage of growth.

So Amazon isn't on some unique path in the business world by choosing to divert its profits to CapEx spending. Its level of CapEx spending is comparable to Wal-Mart at the same stage of growth. It simply has such low margins that it has no profits leftover after its CapEx spending.