A global tax regime DESIGNED to let Amazon off.

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https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/jun/06/global-g7-deal-may-let-amazon-off-hook-on-tax-say-experts

Bezos would happily run Amazon at a net loss. He has said from the very beginning that Amazon should be valued on free cashflow (FCF) not profits. Investors seem to agree.

There's an entire generation of MBAs who are learning that profits a company doesn't disburse as dividends are totally pointless when valuing a company; once a company exceeds a certain threshold, it either dies, or is acquired and companies with high FCF get acquired for huge amounts of money. If it pays a dividend, it pays for reasons unrelated to basic shareholder value (like Microsoft paying a dividend so that certain kinds of index funds can own it).

Investors seemingly prefer share buybacks and with interest rates at essentially zero, they'd prefer that the shares were bought back with debt not with profit.

Tim Apple and Zuck don't agree and they want cash in the bank as a hedge against cyclical downturns and/or being ambushed by Google; so Apple and FB take profits and pay tax for now. But I suspect neither will in 10 years.

Historically a lot of people wrote a lot of laws to stop what global companies now do for granted. Good job we now live in a utopia where monopolies don't matter.

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