Amazon became the second U.S. company to exceed a $1 trillion market capitalization during trading in September 2018, after Apple.
Amazon crossed the threshold on September 4, 2018, roughly one month after Apple reached the same milestone. The event reflected the rapid expansion of Amazon’s e-commerce operations, cloud-computing business, advertising, subscriptions, and logistics network.
Market capitalization is not the same as annual sales. Amazon had already become one of the world’s largest retailers by revenue, but investors also valued its future growth and the profitability potential of Amazon Web Services.
Amazon’s valuation later moved far below or above the trillion-dollar mark as its share price changed. Such milestones are snapshots of public-market pricing rather than permanent measures of a company’s economic importance.