Amazon’s Bezos Plays Nice With Trump; Congratulates Him On Win

Amazon Chief Executive Jeff Bezos may have been an outspoken critic of Donald Trump, but now, the executive is trying to play nice.

On Thursday (Nov. 10), Bezos tweeted his congratulations to Trump, saying: “I for one give him my most open mind and wish him great success in his service to this country.” The congratulatory tone comes after Bezos famously said he would give Trump a one-way ticket to outer space.

Ever since Donald Trump announced he would be running for president, the relationship between Bezos-owned companies and Trump has been contentious. As Forbes pointed out in a report, Trump took aim at Amazon on the campaign trail and even threatened to launch antitrust investigations into Amazon and The Washington Post.

While those were once threats, now that Trump is the president-elect, Bezos has no choice but to play nice. Forbes noted that, since Trump won the election on Tuesday (Nov. 8), shares of Amazon fell 6 percent. In one Trump tweet before the election, he put it this way: “The @WashingtonPost, which loses a fortune, is owned by @JeffBezos for purposes of keeping taxes down at his no profit company, @Amazon.”

“If @Amazon ever had to pay fair taxes, its stock would crash and it would crumble like a paper bag. The @WashingtonPost scam is saving it!” Trump additionally tweeted.

Amazon’s earnings were $252 million in the third quarter, a notable step up from $79 million a year earlier. A solid-looking result — that adds up to about $0.52 cents a share, a big miss on the $0.79 cents a share that analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters expected.

Sales were $32.7 billion — again a solid performance but one that was almost consumed entirely by operating expenses, which climbed 29 percent to $32.1 billion. Investments pushed Amazon’s operating margin down to 1.8 percent — a drop from Q2’s 4.2 percent.