Ann: Quarterly Activities/Appendix 4C Cash Flow Report, page-65

"Amazon started in July 1994. They reported their first profit in Jan. 2004 for the last quarter of 2003. Of course, the book selling business of 1994 and the Amazon of 2004 were very different companies, on its way to the transformation illustrated by the change in Bezos himself.

However, it should be noted that Amazon’s profitability is largely a matter of choice. Amazon’s “problem” has always been that all of its businesses are growing so quickly that they can consume all of the company’s revenues in any given quarter. The decisions to “turn a profit” is always the decisions to “constrain the growth of a given business segment”. For this reason, the choice to measure their success in “free cash flow” might be a good one.

With a company as diverse as Amazon, the issue is always one of making sure you allocate resources to the most potentially profitable businesses."