[dangrossman]

That's the opposite of what those words mean. Profits are dollars that stay with the company. Dollars that leave the company are expenses, some other company's profits. I don't find redefining profit to mean its opposite enlightening here. They're spending cash now in hopes of future profits -- that seems clear enough in plain english.

[quaunaut]

Money not spent is money that isn't working for you, but instead is just sitting in reserve, at best accruing interest. Amazon is betting it can get a much higher return, and so far, has been right.

[epa]

"profit" and "money" are two very different things.

"profit" is how much you are making at the end of the year, this is to be reinvested if you are efficient (as you suggest is good, i agree)

"money" is the what is sitting in the bank, not being utilized.

Would you say that a company who is breaking even is utilizing their cash properly? no, they don't have any cash to utilize, therefore profit and cash are different things.

[quaunaut]

...or they could have just already utilized the cash, which is what Amazon is doing?

[epa]

Capital assets are not fully expensed in the year they are bought.

[ImprovedSilence]

Right, but presumably, the company that spends all it's cash gets something in return for all this money, ideally of equal or greater value to said company than cash spent.

Management (jeff and co) elect to spend cash on bettering the position of the company, (and thus keeping the wealth within the company) opposed to just sending money to the owners (spreading the wealth to stock holders/entities external to the company)

[graeme]

A certain portion of profits will leave the company as taxes. Investing the money now means that amazon gets to use 100% of those dollars.

[epa]

net income != taxable income