Amazon Is Finally Profitable, Earns $2.5 Billion Over the Last Three Months (cnn.com)

An anonymous reader quotes CNN: Amazon topped $2 billion in quarterly profit for the first time in its history, an impressive run fueled by continued growth in Prime subscriptions, cloud computing and its nascent advertising business. Amazon said Thursday that it earned $2.5 billion in profit for the three months ending in June, a staggering jump from the $197 million it posted in the same period last year. It marked the third consecutive quarter that Amazon has topped $1 billion in profit, a remarkable feat for a company once known for investing so much in its business that it often lost money. "The profitability trajectory appears to be accelerating quicker than expected," Daniel Ives, an analyst with GBH Insights, wrote in an investor note Thursday. Ives called this a "potential game changer" as Amazon continues to invest heavily in fulfillment centers, new stores and pricey content deals....

Earlier this month, Amazon's market value topped $900 billion for the first time, putting it on the cusp of eclipsing Apple as the world's most valuable company.
Amazon's cloud computing business, Amazon Web Services, had $6 billion in sales, while Amazon's $119-a-year "Prime" service for faster shipping now has more than 100 million users.

Qwartz says the results -- which are over 12 times more than Amazon earned in the same quarter a year ago -- prove that Amazon "can make loads of money when it actually feels like it."

Comments

Re: Good

[Anonymous Coward]

They have a better business model.

The lowest costs of labor are slavery and/or indentured servitude. As a society weâ(TM)ve decided those arenâ(TM)t fair and made laws to stop them.

If we want a better world we make laws to drive bad behavior out of business.

If you want amazon to pay its people more you raise the minimum wage to a livable wage and you increase taxes on rich people.

Those are not going to happen in this second gilded age.

I have no idea what is going to snap but the way things are going it seems unsustainable for it to continue unabated.

Re:Good

[Zumbs]

Managers and those responsible for profit can be rewarded

Huh? Are you saying that the people who make the webshop and who actually handle the goods that I order -- the people doing the actual work -- are not responsible for making the profit? If so, why doesn't Amazon fire everyone who are not managers and above, because they are the only ones producing an income?

Prime subscriptions

[Maelwryth]

They are being totally underhanded with their prime subscriptions. For instance, upon buying a product I was given three choices; shipping, free two day shipping, or free two day shipping with Prime subscription. I took the free two day shipping but on completion of prchase there was a small box saying "Welcome to Prime" which I hadn't ordered so I clicked it to make sure I wasn't on Prime and it appeared to say I wasn't.....but I was suspicious so I dug into the settings and found I had been added to Prime free membership which would then start charging me monthly if I didn't unenroll before 30 days. So I unenrolled. Of course the product didn't arrive so I called the help line and was charged a dollar, hopefully sorted it out, and they added me to Prime again without my specific consent. I had to ask the operator about it and specify being removed again. As yet the product has not arrived.......