Well, if you were hoping that Donald Trump wasn’t going to tweet anything about Amazon on Thursday and in the process throw a monkey wrench in tech’s effort to rebound from this week’s malaise, you’re going to be disappointed because on the heels of yesterday’s Axios report that sent the shares plunging the most since February 8, Trump is out reminding you that’s he’s hated Amazon for a long time:
I have stated my concerns with Amazon long before the Election. Unlike others, they pay little or no taxes to state & local governments, use our Postal System as their Delivery Boy (causing tremendous loss to the U.S.), and are putting many thousands of retailers out of business!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 29, 2018
There you go. If you were looking for confirmation of the Axios report, you’ve got it– straight from the horse’s mouth.
The Axios report prompted the worst day for the shares since February 8 (yet another “since February 8” moment). Amazon is down nearly 8% in two sessions and has fallen in five of the last six trading days:
The shares erased their pre-market gains on that tweet.
As a reminder, according to sources who spoke to Axios, the President is “obsessed” with the company and wants to “go after it”. Although he’d pitch that effort as something that’s designed to help “everyday” small business owners avoid falling into the Bezos black hole, his motivation is first and foremost tied to his personal vendetta against “the AmazonWashingtonPost” (as he calls it when he’s ranting on Twitter) and secondarily related to complaints from rich people. Here’s Axios:
Trump’s wealthy friends tell him Amazon is destroying their businesses. His real estate buddies tell him — and he agrees — that Amazon is killing shopping malls and brick-and-mortar retailers.
