Share count
10.8Bpeak FY2025
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AMZN, Amazon.com Inc.
Amazon sells hundreds of millions of products to consumers — some it stocks and ships itself, the rest offered by independent merchants on its marketplace, across dozens of categories. It also rents computing power, storage, and software to businesses and developers through Amazon Web Services, and sells advertising and Prime subscriptions alongside the store. The money comes from retail markups and the fees sellers pay, and from the cloud arm that serves enterprises.
In each of our segments, we serve our primary customer sets, consisting of consumers, sellers, developers, enterprises, content creators, advertisers, and employees.
We have organized our operations into three segments: North America, International, and Amazon Web Services ("AWS").
The business
What it sells, where the money comes from, the kind of company it is.
Revenue · FY2025
$716.9B
+12.4% YoY · 13% 5-yr CAGR
Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average
Revenue $742.8B 5-yr avg $582.7B
Revenue $181.5B +16.6% vs yr-ago qtr
Operating margin 13.1% yr-ago 11.8%
Net income $30.3B yr-ago $17.1B
Net margin 16.7% yr-ago 11.0%
The business in brief
read the 10-K →What this business is and what moves its needle, from its own SEC filings.
- What it is
- Revenue is North America (59%), International (23%) and AWS (18%).
- Situation
- Capital build-out. Capital spending has surged to 18% of sales, today's earnings are charged less depreciation than tomorrow's will be.
- What moves the needle
- The whole rests on two different engines, and an owner weighs each. In retail the test is whether scale in warehouses and delivery, paired with a marketplace where buyers and sellers each draw the other in, builds a cost-and-selection edge a rival cannot copy — or whether it stays a thin-margin trade against the intense competition the filing itself names. The cloud arm is where durable, high-return profit must prove itself, and where the room left to reinvest is judged. Set against that: a business that leans on a few shipping companies to move its goods, rests on demand it cannot take for granted, and has drawn the regulators' eye — see the record below for the figures.
- Is it a good business?
- Return on capital has run high across the record (median 22%, above 15% in 7 of 9 years). Owner earnings agree: roughly 8% of revenue reaches owners as cash, consistently, and customers and suppliers fund the business through negative working capital. Whether these returns reflect real pricing power or an accounting artifact is the judgment the 10-K is for.
Drafted from the company's filings and reviewed by hand; every number is shown in full in the sections below.
Where the money comes from
read the 10-K →The largest slice of sales is North America at 59%, but the profit engine is AWS: 18% of revenue and 57% of segment operating profit.
Revenue by reportable segment, FY2025
Operating profit same segments
- North America59%$426.3B37% of profit
- International23%$161.9B6% of profit
- AWS18%$128.7B57% of profit
From the segment footnote of the company's own 10-K. Shares are of total revenue; the profit bar shows each segment's share of segment operating profit, before unallocated corporate costs.
The record
Ten years of arithmetic, read across the cycle.
The record, 2016–2025
realized figures from each filing · older years to the left| 2016’16 | 2017’17 | 2018’18 | 2019’19 | 2020’20 | 2021’21 | 2022’22 | 2023’23 | 2024’24 | 2025’25 | TTMTTMMar 2026 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Income statement | |||||||||||
| $136.0B | $177.9B | $232.9B | $280.5B | $386.1B | $469.8B | $514.0B | $574.8B | $638.0B | $716.9B | $742.8B | RevenueRevenue |
| 35% | 37% | 40% | 41% | 40% | 42% | 44% | 47% | 49% | 50% | 51% | Gross marginGross mgn |
| 2% | 2% | 2% | 2% | 2% | 2% | 2% | 2% | 2% | 2% | 1% | SG&A / revenueSG&A/rev |
| $4.2B | $4.1B | $12.4B | $14.5B | $22.9B | $24.9B | $12.2B | $36.9B | $68.6B | $80.0B | $85.4B | Operating incomeOp. inc. |
| 3.1% | 2.3% | 5.3% | 5.2% | 5.9% | 5.3% | 2.4% | 6.4% | 10.8% | 11.2% | 11.5% | Operating marginOp. mgn |
| $2.4B | $3.0B | $10.1B | $11.6B | $21.3B | $33.4B | ($2.7B) | $30.4B | $59.2B | $77.7B | $90.8B | Net incomeNet inc. |
| 38% | 20% | 11% | 17% | 12% | 13% | — | 19% | 14% | 20% | 21% | Effective tax rateTax rate |
| Cash flow & returns | |||||||||||
| $17.2B | $18.4B | $30.7B | $38.5B | $66.1B | $46.3B | $46.8B | $84.9B | $115.9B | $139.5B | $148.5B | Operating cash flowOp. cash |
| $8.1B | $11.5B | $15.3B | $21.8B | $25.2B | $34.4B | $41.9B | $48.7B | $52.8B | $65.8B | $70.4B | DepreciationDeprec. |
| $3.7B | ($361M) | ($109M) | ($1.7B) | $10.3B | ($34.2B) | ($12.1B) | ($18.2B) | ($18.2B) | ($23.4B) | ($32.5B) | Working capital & otherWC & other |
| $6.7B | $12.0B | $13.4B | $16.9B | $40.1B | $61.1B | $63.6B | $52.7B | $83.0B | $131.8B | $151.0B | CapexCapex |
| 5.0% | 6.7% | 5.8% | 6.0% | 10.4% | 13.0% | 12.4% | 9.2% | 13.0% | 18.4% | 20.3% | Capex / revenueCapex/rev |
| $10.5B | $6.4B | $17.3B | $21.7B | $40.9B | $11.9B | $4.8B | $32.2B | $63.1B | $73.8B | $78.1B | Owner earningsOwner earn. |
| 7.7% | 3.6% | 7.4% | 7.7% | 10.6% | 2.5% | 0.9% | 5.6% | 9.9% | 10.3% | 10.5% | Owner earnings marginOE mgn |
| $10.5B | $6.4B | $17.3B | $21.7B | $25.9B | ($14.7B) | ($16.9B) | $32.2B | $32.9B | $7.7B | ($2.5B) | Free cash flowFCF |
| 7.7% | 3.6% | 7.4% | 7.7% | 6.7% | −3.1% | −3.3% | 5.6% | 5.2% | 1.1% | −0.3% | Free cash flow marginFCF mgn |
| $116M | $14.0B | $2.2B | $2.5B | — | — | — | — | — | — | $19.3B | AcquisitionsAcquis. |
| — | — | — | — | $0 | $0 | $6.0B | $0 | $0 | — | — | BuybacksBuybacks |
| 30% | 10% | 30% | 24% | 24% | 14% | — | 15% | 22% | 16% | 15% | ROICROIC |
| 12% | 11% | 23% | 19% | 23% | 24% | -2% | 15% | 21% | 19% | 21% | Return on equityROE |
| 12% | 11% | 23% | 19% | 23% | 24% | −2% | 15% | 21% | 19% | 21% | Retained to equityRetained/eq |
| Balance sheet | |||||||||||
| $26.0B | $31.0B | $41.3B | $55.0B | $84.4B | $96.0B | $70.0B | $86.8B | $101.2B | $123.0B | $143.1B | Cash & investmentsCash+inv |
| $8.3B | $13.2B | $16.7B | $20.8B | $24.5B | $32.9B | $42.4B | $52.3B | $55.5B | $67.7B | $75.5B | ReceivablesReceiv. |
| $11.5B | $16.0B | $17.2B | $20.5B | $23.8B | $32.6B | $34.4B | $33.3B | $34.2B | $38.3B | $36.5B | InventoryInvent. |
| $25.3B | $34.6B | $38.2B | $47.2B | $72.5B | $78.7B | $79.6B | $85.0B | $94.4B | $121.9B | $124.7B | Accounts payablePayables |
| ($5.5B) | ($5.4B) | ($4.3B) | ($5.9B) | ($24.2B) | ($13.1B) | ($2.8B) | $590M | ($4.7B) | ($15.9B) | ($12.7B) | Operating working capitalOper. WC |
| $45.8B | $60.2B | $75.1B | $96.3B | $132.7B | $161.6B | $146.8B | $172.4B | $190.9B | $229.1B | $255.2B | Current assetsCur. assets |
| $43.8B | $57.9B | $68.4B | $87.8B | $126.4B | $142.3B | $155.4B | $164.9B | $179.4B | $218.0B | $216.8B | Current liabilitiesCur. liab. |
| 1.0× | 1.0× | 1.1× | 1.1× | 1.1× | 1.1× | 0.9× | 1.0× | 1.1× | 1.1× | 1.2× | Current ratioCurr. ratio |
| $3.8B | $13.3B | $14.5B | $14.8B | $15.0B | $15.4B | $20.3B | $22.8B | $23.1B | $23.3B | $23.4B | GoodwillGoodwill |
| $83.4B | $131.3B | $162.6B | $225.2B | $321.2B | $420.5B | $462.7B | $527.9B | $624.9B | $818.0B | $916.6B | Total assetsAssets |
| $8.8B | $24.8B | $24.9B | $24.7B | $33.0B | $50.2B | $70.1B | $66.8B | $57.6B | $68.4B | $121.9B | Total debtDebt |
| ($17.2B) | ($6.1B) | ($16.4B) | ($30.3B) | ($51.4B) | ($45.8B) | $123M | ($20.0B) | ($43.6B) | ($54.6B) | ($21.2B) | Net debt / (cash)Net debt |
| 8.6× | 4.8× | 8.8× | 9.1× | 13.9× | 13.8× | 5.2× | 11.6× | 28.5× | 35.2× | 33.7× | Interest coverageInt. cov. |
| $19.3B | $27.7B | $43.5B | $62.1B | $93.4B | $138.2B | $146.0B | $201.9B | $286.0B | $411.1B | $441.9B | Shareholders’ equityEquity |
| 2.2% | 2.4% | 2.3% | 2.4% | 2.4% | 2.7% | 3.8% | 4.2% | 3.5% | 2.7% | 2.7% | Stock comp / revenueSBC/rev |
| Per share | |||||||||||
| 9.68B | 9.86B | 10.00B | 10.08B | 10.20B | 10.30B | 10.19B | 10.49B | 10.72B | 10.83B | 10.87B | Shares out (diluted)Shares |
| $14.05 | $18.04 | $23.29 | $27.83 | $37.86 | $45.63 | $50.44 | $54.78 | $59.51 | $66.22 | $68.31 | Revenue / shareRev/sh |
| $0.24 | $0.31 | $1.01 | $1.15 | $2.09 | $3.24 | $-0.27 | $2.90 | $5.53 | $7.17 | $8.35 | EPS (diluted)EPS |
| $1.08 | $0.65 | $1.73 | $2.15 | $4.01 | $1.16 | $0.47 | $3.07 | $5.88 | $6.81 | $7.18 | Owner earnings / shareOE/sh |
| $1.08 | $0.65 | $1.73 | $2.15 | $2.54 | $-1.43 | $-1.66 | $3.07 | $3.07 | $0.71 | $-0.23 | Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh |
| $0.70 | $1.21 | $1.34 | $1.67 | $3.94 | $5.93 | $6.25 | $5.03 | $7.74 | $12.18 | $13.89 | Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh |
| $1.99 | $2.81 | $4.35 | $6.16 | $9.16 | $13.43 | $14.33 | $19.24 | $26.67 | $37.97 | $40.64 | Book value / shareBVPS |
Share counts before 2020 are restated ×20 for a stock split, so per-share figures sit on one basis.
Per-share growththe realized rate an owner's share compounded
| 9-yr | 5-yr | |
|---|---|---|
| Revenue / share | +18.8%/yr | +11.8%/yr |
| Owner earnings / share | +22.7%/yr | +11.2%/yr |
| EPS | +45.5%/yr | +28.0%/yr |
| Capital spending / share | +37.4%/yr | +25.3%/yr |
| Book value / share | +38.7%/yr | +32.9%/yr |
The record, charted
FY2016–2025Each measure over its full record; the current point and the worst year marked. Share counts on the current split basis.
ROIC
16%low FY2017
Gross margin
50%low FY2016
Owner earnings vs. net income
Owner earningsNet incomeThe accountant's number, and the cash an owner can take; the gap is the tell.
$73.8Bowner earningsvs.$77.7Bnet incomelow FY2022
Where the cash went
ReinvestBuybacksDividendsAcquisitionsRetainedBeyond op. cashEach year's outlays against its operating cash: the mix, and how it drifts. The hatched cap is spending beyond that year's operating cash — financed from the balance sheet or borrowing, not operations.
FY2016FY2025
Net income is the accountant's number; owner earnings is the cash an owner could take out. The walk between them, off the cash-flow statement, and whether the gap is widening or holding.
In fiscal 2025 the business earned $73.8B of owner earnings, the operating cash left after the $65.8B it takes just to hold its position. It put $66.1B more into growth; free cash flow, after that spending, was $7.7B.
| FY2025 | FY2024 | FY2023 | FY2022 | FY2021 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reported net income | $77.7B | $59.2B | $30.4B | ($2.7B) | $33.4B |
| Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back | +$65.8B | +$52.8B | +$48.7B | +$41.9B | +$34.4B |
| Stock-based compensationreal costnon-cash, but a real cost | +$19.5B | +$22.0B | +$24.0B | +$19.6B | +$12.8B |
| Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items | −$23.4B | −$18.2B | −$18.2B | −$12.1B | −$34.2B |
| Cash from operations | $139.5B | $115.9B | $84.9B | $46.8B | $46.3B |
| Maintenance capital expenditurethe spending needed just to hold position and volume | −$65.8B | −$52.8B | −$52.7B | −$41.9B | −$34.4B |
| Owner earnings | $73.8B | $63.1B | $32.2B | $4.8B | $11.9B |
| Growth capital expenditurediscretionary; spent to get bigger, not to stand still | −$66.1B | −$30.2B | — | −$21.7B | −$26.6B |
| Free cash flow | $7.7B | $32.9B | $32.2B | ($16.9B) | ($14.7B) |
| Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue | 10% | 10% | 6% | 1% | 3% |
Owner earnings is the cash an owner could pull out without starving the business: operating cash less the maintenance capital it must spend to hold its position (here about $65.8B, roughly its depreciation, the rate its assets wear out). The other $66.1B of its capital spending is growth it chose, not upkeep it owed; charged only with the maintenance it must do, the business earns well more than the year's free cash flow shows. The cash-flow statement also adds stock comp back as non-cash, but it is a real cost paid in shares; counted as the expense it is (less $19.5B), owner earnings is nearer $54.3B.
Maintenance capex is estimated as depreciation where a growing business invests above it; free cash flow is the figure the scorecard's free-cash margin reads.
Quality & stewardship
Returns, the balance sheet, capital allocation, and pay.
Owner’s Scorecard
FY2025 10-K · source on SEC EDGAR →
Will it survive?
- Can it pay its interest? 35.2×ComfortableOperating income $80.0B ÷ interest expense $2.3B
What this means
Operating profit covers interest with the kind of margin Graham wanted for a defensive holding. Necessary, not sufficient, it says solvent, not cheap.
- Net cashCash $86.8B + ST investments $36.2B − debt $68.4B
What this means
Cash and short-term investments exceed every dollar of debt by $54.6B, on net the company owes nothing, and can act from strength when others can't. Net debt is the leverage figure that matters: the cash is already set against the debt. Strategic or illiquid investments aren't counted here.
- Negative, funded by othersDSO 34 + DIO 39 − DPO 125 days
What this means
Days cash is tied up between paying suppliers and collecting from customers. A negative cycle is a quiet moat: suppliers and customers fund the operation (Buffett's “float”), the company grows on other people's money.
Is it a good business?
- High through the cycle9-yr median, range 10%–30%; 16% latest = NOPAT $64.2B ÷ invested capital $392.7BIndustry peers: median 15%
What this means
The rate the business earns on the money tied up in it, Buffett's north star, because over time a stock tracks the ROIC beneath it. Above ~15% sustained hints at a moat; a return below the cost of capital (~8%) erodes value as a business grows rather than building it — the test Buffett weighs most. The headline is the median of the last 9 years (it ran 16% most recently), so one peak or trough year doesn't set the verdict. Asset-light businesses (R&D expensed, little capital) read artificially high, pair this with Owner Earnings.
- Solid through the cycle10-yr median margin, range 1%–11%; latest $73.8B = operating cash $139.5B − maintenance capex $65.8BIndustry peers: median 2%
What this means
What an owner could take out without starving the business: operating cash less the maintenance capital it must spend to hold its position — Buffett's owner earnings. That's 10% of revenue this year, a 7% median across 10 years. It chose to put $66.1B more into growth, so free cash flow this year was $7.7B — the gap is investment, not weakness. Treating stock comp as the real expense it is (less $19.5B of SBC) leaves $54.3B.
- Cash-backedCash from ops $139.5B ÷ net income $77.7B
What this means
How much of reported profit showed up as operating cash. Above 1× is reassuring; well below suggests earnings lean on accruals. One year is noisy, growth and working-capital swings distort it, and this is operating cash, not free cash. Watch the multi-year trend.
How is the cash used?
- Reinvests most of itDividends + buybacks $0 ÷ Owner Earnings $73.8B
What this means
Of $73.8B Owner Earnings, $0 (0%) went back to shareholders, $0 dividends, $0 buybacks. Returning most of it is the mark of a mature business with little left to reinvest at a high return; reinvesting most could mean a long runway, or empire-building. The split doesn't say which; the return earned on it (see ROIC) does.
- Investing or harvesting? 2.00×ExpandingCapex $131.8B ÷ depreciation $65.8B
What this means
Descriptive, not a grade. Above ~1× means investing faster than assets wear out (growth, or, sustained for years, today's earnings carrying less depreciation than tomorrow's will). Below means spending less than it's wearing out (efficiency, or a melting asset base). The ratio won't tell you which; the filings will.
Graham’s defensive tests · 2 of 6 met
Graham’s numerical criteria for the defensive investor (The Intelligent Investor, ch. 14), run on the filings. A floor of safety, not a buy signal; many fine modern businesses fail his strictest liquidity rules by design.
- Adequate size PassRevenue ≥ $2B · $716.9B
What this means
Big enough to weather a storm. Graham's 1972 floor was ~$100M of sales (≈ $700M today); we use a $2B revenue line as a conservative modern stand-in.
- Strong liquidity MissCurrent ratio ≥ 2× · 1.05×
What this means
Current assets at least twice current liabilities, near-term bills covered without touching the business. Strict by design: many cash-rich modern firms run leaner and miss it, holding their cushion in longer-dated securities.
- Conservative debt MissDebt ≤ working capital · $68.4B vs $11.1B WC
What this means
Graham's rule that borrowings not exceed net current assets. Capital-heavy and buyback-heavy firms routinely fail it, read it next to interest coverage, not alone.
- Earnings stability NearA profit every year (10-yr record) · 1 loss year
What this means
Graham wanted earnings in each of the past ten years, the stability a defensive owner leans on.
- Dividend record MissUninterrupted dividends · none paid
What this means
An unbroken dividend was Graham's mark of durability. He wanted twenty years; the filings show about ten, and a single suspension breaks the streak. Non-payers, many fine modern compounders, fall outside his defensive net by design.
- Earnings growth PassEarnings +33% over the record · +981%
What this means
At least a third more earnings than a decade ago, averaging three years at each end. Net income (not per-share), so stock splits don't distort it, buybacks and dilution show up in the share-count line instead.
- Moderate price —P/E ≤ 15 and P/E × P/B ≤ 22.5 · decided by the price
What this means
Graham's valuation gate, the wall he kept between a sound business and a sound investment. Three-year average earnings are $5.19/share (latest year $7.22), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $38.21/share. Enter a price in “What the price implies” just below for the P/E, P/B, and whether it clears. But this is the rule Buffett outgrew: there's no hard P/E law, and a wonderful business can deserve a far richer multiple if the thesis holds, treat it as the bargain-hunter's floor, not a verdict on the price.
Durability & moat, 2016–2025
Whether the record’s returns held, and what the capital reinvested earned.
- Profitable years 9 of 10
What this means
Lost money in 1 year(s), look at what happened there before trusting the average.
- Return on capital ≥ 15% 7 of 10 yrs
What this means
A moat shows up as a high return on invested capital that holds year after year, not one good vintage.
- Operating margin 4% → 9% (3-yr avg ends)
In the filing’s words The margin widened even though the filing names price competition — the gain came from volume or cost, not pricing power. Read where.
What this means
Through the cycle the operating margin widened — about 4% early to 9% lately, median 5% — pricing power intact or improving.
- Reinvestment, incremental ROIC 18%
What this means
Every extra dollar the business reinvested came back at a high incremental return — the lens GBM read for a moat that reinvests rather than merely harvests. The record and the 10-K are where you check whether the rate holds.
- Owner earnings growth +26%/yr
What this means
Owner earnings grew about 26% a year over the record.
- Worst year 2017 · 2.3% op. margin
What this means
Stayed profitable even in its hardest year, the resilience that survives recessions.
- How management talks about it Owner’s terms
What this means
The record and the register agree: capital is compounding and the filing reasons in an owner’s terms — per-share value, return on capital, the long term — not a promoter’s.
Does AI threaten the moat?
Moderate contestabilityAI is likely to reshape costs and some products here without clearly contesting or sparing the core moat; how the company itself frames it is the tell.
In its own filing Named as a competitive risk
Its FY2025 10-K names artificial intelligence as a competitive threat.
“In addition, new and enhanced technologies, including search, web and infrastructure computing services, practical applications of artificial intelligence and machine learning, digital content, satellites, and electronic devices continue to increase our competition.”
The question is whether a moat the record shows as durable outlasts a technology that lowers the cost of part of what the firm sells. The durability is read in the record above, the filing's own framing of AI beside it; the industry label decides nothing on its own.
Read from the filing's own risk factors, paired with the industry's structure under its SIC code; the durability is read above, the price below.
All figures as filed; the source filing is linked above.
Current Position
as of the latest quarter, Mar 31, 2026Can the business pay what it owes this year, off the freshest balance sheet: the quality of the assets, the debt actually coming due, and what a low ratio means here.
Current assets$255.2B
- Cash & short-term investments$143.1B
- Receivables$75.5B
- Inventory$36.5B
Current liabilities$216.8B
- Debt due within a year$2.8B
- Accounts payable$124.7B
- Other current liabilities$89.2B
Current ratio1.18×all current assets ÷ what's due · Graham looked for 2×
Quick ratio1.01×stricter: inventory excluded
Cash ratio0.66×strictest: cash alone against what's due
Working capital$38.4Bthe cushion left after near-term bills
Debt due this year vs. cash$2.8B due · $143.1B cash
covered by cash on hand, no refinancing forced · both figures from the Mar 31, 2026 balance sheet
Revenue, latest quarter vs. a year ago+16.6%the freshest read on whether the business is still growing
Current ratio, recent quarters1.1× → 1.2×
Deeper floors
Tangible book value$409.3Bequity stripped of goodwill & intangibles
Debt incl. operating leases$213.5B$91.6B of it operating leases; with finance leases, “total fixed claims” below reaches $169.9B (annual-report basis)
Deferred revenue$25.3Bcustomer cash collected before delivery; operating float
From the company's latest filing.
Debt maturity
the debt note, SEC EDGAR →Not how much it owes, but when it falls due, and against what. The ladder the company files, beside cash on hand and a year's owner earnings.
Bars scaled to the largest single year; “later” is everything due after 2030, shown apart since it dwarfs the years.
Due in the next 12 months$5.2Bthe first rung: what must be repaid or rolled over within the year
Within two years$16.5Bthe near wall, the part most exposed to today’s credit conditions
Biggest single year$11.3Bin 2027the lumpiest maturity, where a refinancing, if needed, is largest
Total scheduled principal$108.2Bevery year plus what lies beyond, as the footnote totals it
Against what the business has and earns
Cash & short-term investments, Mar 31, 2026$143.1B
One year of owner earnings (FY2025)$73.8B
Together, against $5.2B due next year41.7×
Cash on hand as of Mar 31, 2026 plus a year’s owner earnings comes to $216.8B against the $5.2B due in the twelve months after the Dec 31, 2025 schedule: 42 times it.
Maturity schedule extracted from the company’s Dec 31, 2025 annual report and reconciled to the total the table states.
Lease obligations
the lease note, SEC EDGAR →Debt by another name. What the business owes on the property, aircraft, stores and equipment it rents rather than owns is a fixed claim due on a schedule; added back to the debt, it is the true leverage. That ladder, operating and finance leases together, and what it adds to the debt on the page above.
Operating leasesFinance leases
Lease payments by year, scaled to the largest; “later” is everything beyond year five, shown apart. These are the contractual cash payments, before the interest the filing imputes back out to the balance-sheet liability.
Due in the next 12 months$17.2Ba fixed cash payment, owed whether or not the business has a good year
Total lease payments$121.8Bevery year plus the tail, undiscounted: the full cash the leases will take
On the balance sheet$101.5Bthe present value of those payments, the recognised lease liability
True leverage: debt plus leases
On-balance-sheet debt$68.4B
Lease obligations (present value)$101.5B
Total fixed claims on the business$169.9B
Counting the leases the way Buffett does, the fixed claims on this business come to $169.9B, of which the leases are 60%, more than the debt itself. The lease wall above and the debt schedule together are the calendar of what must be paid, and when.
Lease ladder read from the ASC 842 tags in the company’s Dec 31, 2025 annual report and reconciled: the yearly buckets sum to the undiscounted total, which less the imputed interest equals the balance-sheet liability; a ladder that doesn’t tie out is withheld.
How the cash was used, 2016–2025
Over the record, the business generated $604.3B of operating cash; how management split it reads as a reinvestor, most operating cash is plowed back into the business.
- Reinvested$481.4B · 80%
- Buybacks$6.0B · 1%
- Retained (debt / cash)$116.9B · 19%
- Returned to owners$6.0B
2% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $0 as dividends and $6.0B as buybacks.
- Source of fundingOperating cash
Operating cash covered reinvestment and returns; over the span debt rose $113.2B and cash and short-term investments rose $117.1B.
- Average price paid for buybacks$129.87
Across the years where the filing reports a share count, 46M shares were bought for $6.0B, about $129.87 each.
- Net change in share count12.3%
The diluted count rose from 9680M to 10874M: issuance (stock pay, deals) outran any buybacks, so owners were diluted on net.
- Dividend record—
No dividend line was reported in the filing data over the span; the record here neither confirms nor rules out a payout.
- Return on what it retained19%
Of the earnings it kept rather than paid out ($240.4B over the span), annual owner earnings (first three years vs last three) grew $45.0B, so each retained $1 added about 0.19 of yearly owner earnings. Buffett's test, run on owner earnings instead of market value.
Buybacks are gross of stock issued to staff; the share-count line above is the net of that, the figure that decides whether owners gained. The average price paid blends a year of purchases (and any accelerated repurchase), so it is close, not exact. The record of where the cash went and on what terms.
Management, ownership & pay
read the proxy →From the proxy: how much of the business the people running it own, and how they are paid, beside what the business earned for its owners in the same years.
| Fiscal year | Chief executive | Pay, as filed | “Actually paid” | Owner earnings |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | Andrew R. Jassy | $212.7M | $208.0M | $11.9B |
| 2021 | Jeffrey P. Bezos | $1.7M | $1.7M | $11.9B |
| 2022 | Andrew R. Jassy | $1.3M | −$147.7M | $4.8B |
| 2023 | Andrew R. Jassy | $1.4M | $109.6M | $32.2B |
| 2024 | Andrew R. Jassy | $1.6M | $92.4M | $63.1B |
| 2025 | Andrew R. Jassy | $2.1M | $13.2M | $73.8B |
Both pay figures are the company’s own, from the pay-versus-performance table its proxy statement files. “As filed” is the Summary Compensation Table total: salary, bonus, and equity awards at their value on the day of grant. “Actually paid” is the SEC’s prescribed recalculation, which re-marks those equity awards to what they became as they vested; it can swing far above or below the filed figure in either direction, and negative years occur. Owner earnings are the whole business's, from the record above, for the same fiscal years.
- Insider ownership8.9%
The stake all directors and executive officers hold together, per the 2026 proxy: skin in the game, the first thing Munger reads.
- Stock-based compensation$19.5B
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, 3% of revenue, equal to 24% of operating profit. Buffett's oldest accounting fight: this is compensation, compensation is an expense, real whether or not the headline earnings admit it. One trap: the cash-flow statement adds SBC back, so the operating cash, and the owner earnings drawn from it, are flattered by exactly this amount; counted as the cost it is, what an owner keeps is lower.
Inverting the record
Invert: instead of why Amazon.com Inc. is a good business, the question is what would make owning it a mistake, and whether those marks are in the record. Disconfirming tests across 2016–2025.
2 of the 6 tests turned up something to look into; the other 4 came back clean.
- Look hereDid the share count rise anyway?12.3%
Diluted shares grew 12.3% over 2016–2025, even as the company spent $6.0B on buybacks. The repurchases were a treadmill: stock issued to staff outran them, so owners' slice still shrank. Read the buyback line beside this one, not on its own.
- Look hereDid debt outgrow the business?$8.8B → $121.9B
Debt rose from $8.8B to $121.9B while owner earnings went from about $11.4B to $56.4B — about 0.8 years of owner earnings in debt then, about 2.2 now: measured against what the business earns, the balance sheet carries more debt than it did. Debt raised for buybacks or deals rather than growth is the kind that bites in a downturn.
And these came back clean
- Is it less profitable than it was?
- Did reported profit become cash?
- Did receivables and inventory outpace sales?
- Are "one-time" charges a yearly habit?
Each test is read from the filings and is noisy alone; a flag can mark a cyclical trough or a year of heavy investment as easily as a problem. The filing says which.
Peers, E-Commerce & Marketplaces
The same industry, side by side on owner economics. Each figure is a through-cycle median, so a peak or trough year can’t distort it; the group median at the foot is the line to read each against.
| Company | Revenue | Gross margin | Op. margin | ROIC | Owner earn. margin |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| AMZNAmazon.com Inc. | $716.9B | 42% | 5.3% | 22% | 8% |
| CVSCVS Health Corporation | $402.1B | 39% | 4.2% | 7% | 4% |
| CPNGCoupang Inc. | $34.5B | 23% | -0.5% | — | 2% |
| CDWCDW Corp. | $22.4B | 17% | 6.6% | 17% | 5% |
| DKSDick's Sporting Goods | $17.2B | 32% | 7.1% | 28% | 6% |
| CHWYChewy Inc. | $12.6B | 27% | -0.8% | — | 2% |
| WWayfair | $12.5B | 28% | -5.4% | — | 1% |
| NSITInsight Enterprises | $8.2B | 15% | 3.4% | 13% | 2% |
| Group median | — | 27% | 3.8% | 17% | 3% |
The price
What a price has to assume.
What the price implies
reverse-DCFType today's close and see the owner-earnings growth you'd have to believe to justify it, beside what Amazon.com Inc. has delivered.
Amazon.com Inc.’s latest year shows negative owner earnings, the mark of a build-out: total capital spending outruns the cash the business throws off today. So the tool opens on the steady-state base (maintenance capex in place of the build-out spend), the cash it would earn at rest; clear the toggle below to read the latest year exactly as reported.
$
Through the cycle, Amazon.com Inc. earns about $54.2B on its 7.6% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s 10.3% margin runs above that; the reported figure may flatter a peak you'd be paying on. Normalize, below, values the price on that through-cycle figure rather than the latest year. It comes pre-checked here for that reason, the same rule that already normalizes a trough; clear it to price the year as filed.
Base
—
The assumptions
9.0% = the 4.55% 10-year Treasury (Jul 15, 2026) + 4.45 points of equity premium. The rate you require is yours to set.
Enter a price above to run it.
A dated snapshot of the price you typed, the assumptions you set, and what the page showed for them. A snapshot is never edited after it is saved. Your notebook is yours alone — the commitment states what is stored and what we will never do.
Implied by the price—
Owner-earnings growth · ’21→’25+69%/yr
Owner-earnings growth · ’16→’25+10%/yr
Owner-earnings growth · ’16→’25+26%/yr
Owner-earnings yield—
What a growth belief costs, in multiples
The growth each return requires, at your price
P/E (3-yr earnings ’23–’25)—
P/B—
Graham’s price gate—
Graham capped the multiple at 15×; Buffett and Munger let that rule go: a wonderful business can deserve 50× if the thesis holds. The gate marks the bargain-hunter's floor.
Against a high-grade bond: Graham’s yardstick bond yield%
Prefilled with the 10-year Treasury (4.55%, as of Jul 15, 2026). Edit it for today’s exact figure, or a AAA corporate yield.
Graham measured a stock against the bond you could own instead, the heart of his margin of safety. Enter a price above to weigh the owner-earnings yield against this bond.
Owner-earnings yield—
High-grade bond yield—
Margin over the bond—
Free cash flow ($2.5B) on 10757M shares outstanding, per the 10-Q cover, as of 2026-04-22; net cash $21.2B. The base opens on the through-cycle figure (the latest year sits above the record’s own median, and Graham’s averaging cuts both ways); clear Normalize to use the year as filed. Net of stock comp treats option pay as the expense it is. Capex ($151.0B) runs well above depreciation ($70.4B), so this is a build-out; Steady-state swaps total capex for maintenance (≈ depreciation), lifting the base to about $82.8B, the cash it would throw off if it stopped expanding. The dials set the multiple a growth belief justifies; the price, and every dollar on this page, is yours.
Cite: Owner Scorecard, "Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN), the owner's record," https://ownerscorecard.com/c/AMZN, data as of 2026-07-09.
Manual order: ← AMTM its page in the Manual AN →
Industry order: ← ACVA the E-Commerce & Marketplaces chapter BBBY →