Finance

Apart from the May $1997$ IPO, when Amazon raised $$54$ million in equity, the company had not

turned to the equity markets to fund its growth. Instead, Amazon had occasionally raised debt $($in $1999,$

$2002,2012,$ and $2017),$ but the majority of its expansion had been funded from operating cash flows.

Indeed, Amazon's cash flows were sufficiently strong to allow it to provide loans to some of its

suppliers and offer significant rewards through various consumer credit offerings.

In March $2015,$ Amazon introduced the Prime Store Card. The card, which was administered

through Synchrony Financial, was available to Prime members with no annual fee and offered $5\%$ cash

back for all purchases on

Amazon.com. ${?}^{178}$ It could only be used on

Amazon.com. In January $2017,$

Amazon launched the Prime Rewards Visa Card in partnership with JPMorgan Chase & Co$.$ Like the

Prime Store Card, this card came with no annual fee and offered $5\%$ cash back on

Amazon.com

purchases, but it could also be used elsewhere for $1-2\%$ cash back. ${?}^{179}$ Consumer Intelligence Research

Partners reported that owners of Amazon credit cards spent on average $16\%$ more on the site than

Prime members without a card. ${?}^{180}$ More recently, in June $2019,$ Amazon partnered again with

Synchrony Financial to launch the Amazon Credit Builder program, which offered similar perks as its

other cards $-$ though with lower credit limits $-$ to consumers with little or poor credit history. ${?}^{181}$

The Path Ahead

In early $2021,$ Amazon's shareholders were delighted with the company's performance $($see

Exhibits $4-10),$ but, for some time, Amazon had been drawing criticism at the highest level in the United

States: the White House. On March $29,2018,$ President Trump attacked Amazon by tweeting that the

company did not pay enough taxes and implied that he might use the power of the presidency to$.$ create financial analysis from amazon.com, $2021$ report.