The company released its official fourth quarter 2000 results this week. Net sales for the fourth quarter of 2000 were $972 million, an increase of 44% on last year. For the year ended December 31st, 2000, net sales were $2.76 billion, a 68% increase over 1999.
"Over the past year, our US pro forma operating loss decreased from 24% of net sales in the fourth quarter of 1999 to less than 2% in the fourth quarter of 2000," said Warren Jenson, Amazon.com chief financial officer. "While the strength of consumer spending remains uncertain, and there are no guarantees, we expect Amazon.com as a whole to reach operating profitability in the fourth quarter of this year."
Morningstar.com analyst David Kathman said he believes “Amazon's profitability goals are achievable given the company's new cost cutting strategy”. The job losses will be in the US only, the cuts being split between corporate headquarters, a distribution centre and a customer service centre.
Amazon.com founder and CEO Jeff Bezos told Wall Street analysts that the decision to axe the workers was “clearly the right business decision for us as we pursue making this into a profitable company.”