Amazon became an unfortunate first when its market value reached $879 billion on Wednesday, down from a high of $1.88 trillion in July 2021. It’s the first company ever to lose over $1 trillion in market value, as previously reported by Bloomberg.
Amazon isn’t the only company feeling the impact of a cooling economy and a return to life out of the home after the initial Covid-19 lockdowns. Microsoft’s market value peaked at around $2.5 trillion and sits at $1.78 trillion at the time of this writing. Meta, formerly known as Facebook, reached just over $1 trillion in value in August 2021 and now sits at about $285 billion. The Dow Jones Industrial Average is down a little more than 8% so far this year, but has been lower.
Video game sales are expected to fall overall in 2022. Likewise, media streamers boomed in 2021, but once stable giants like Netflix are looking for more revenue amid financial instability.
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy recently launched a cost-cutting review of the company, the Wall Street Journal reported. It apparently includes suspending or eliminating unprofitable projects and reassigning workers. Amazon is taking a close look at its devices business, which includes Alexa-enabled smart speakers, the report noted. No real-world impact to the popular devices or their future has been identified yet.
Amazon did not immediately respond to request for comment.
