Amazon priced its shares at US$18 each when it went public in May 1997.
The online bookseller began trading on the Nasdaq on May 15, 1997, under the symbol AMZN. Amazon’s prospectus famously warned investors that the company expected substantial future losses, reflecting the uncertainty surrounding online retail at the time.
Amazon later expanded from books into a broad marketplace, logistics, digital media, devices, and cloud computing through Amazon Web Services. That diversification transformed its revenue base and helped drive a dramatic increase in market capitalization over the following decades.
Stock splits mean the original US$18 price is not directly comparable with today’s quoted share price. Amazon completed multiple splits, including a 20-for-1 split in 2022, which changes the per-share figure without changing the value of shareholders’ overall holdings at the moment of the split.