If you're considering an investment in Amazon (AMZN +1.41%) stock, you may be wondering who owns the company. Founder Jeff Bezos launched Amazon from his garage in Bellevue, Washington, in 1994, back when the World Wide Web was in its infancy. In 1995, the company officially launched as an online bookseller.
Since then, Amazon has grown into an e-commerce behemoth that's been referred to as "the everything store." In 2024, it boasted net sales of $638 billion. Its market cap as of this writing is around $2.29 trillion.
But Amazon is no longer just an e-commerce company. It's become a disruptor in cloud computing services, with Amazon Web Services, as well as entertainment, with Amazon Prime Video. It's produced an array of hardware devices ranging from the Kindle e-reader, which revolutionized the way people read books, to Echo, the smart speaker service, along with personal speaker Alexa. It's made forays into groceries through Amazon Fresh and its purchase of Whole Foods, as well as healthcare, with Amazon Pharmacy. Now Amazon is also on the cutting edge of various technologies powered by artificial intelligence (AI).
Who is the owner of Amazon?
As a publicly traded company, Amazon is owned by its shareholders. Anyone with a brokerage account can invest money in the stock.
The e-commerce giant's largest shareholder is its founder, Bezos, who resigned as the company's CEO in 2021 and now serves as its executive chairman. According to Forbes, Bezos is currently the fourth-richest person in the world. As of July 2025, Bezos owned roughly 884 million shares of Amazon stock, which amounts to a stake of more than 8%.
A graduate of Princeton University, Bezos founded Amazon after quitting his job as an executive at D.E. Shaw. He founded Amazon after creating a list of 20 products he believed could achieve strong sales online and landing on books, with the goal of eventually creating a broader e-commerce retailer.
Bezos took Amazon public in 1997, but the company didn't turn an annual profit until 2003. Bezos also founded Blue Origin, a private spaceflight company, in 2000. In 2013, he became the owner of The Washington Post as well.
FRA: AMZ
Key Data Points
E-commerce
Who serves on Amazon's board of directors?
Amazon's board of directors consists of the following 12 members:
- Jeff Bezos: Amazon's founder and former CEO continues to serve as executive chair of the company's board.
- Andrew Jassy: Jassy was appointed CEO and president after Bezos' departure as CEO and also serves on Amazon's board of directors.
- Keith Alexander: Alexander joined Amazon's board of directors in September 2020.
- Edith W. Cooper: Cooper has served as an Amazon board member since 2021.
- Jamie Gorelick: Gorelick joined Amazon's board in 2012.
- Daniel Huttenlocher: Huttenlocher has been an Amazon board member since 2016.
- Andrew Ng: Ng joined Amazon's board in 2024.
- Indra Nooyi: Nooyi has been an Amazon board member since 2019.
- Jonathan Rubinstein: Rubinstein became a member of Amazon's board in 2010.
- Brad Smith: Smith has been an Amazon board member since 2023.
- Patricia Stonesifer: Stonesifer joined Amazon's board in 1997.
- Wendell Weeks: Weeks has served on Amazon's board of directors since 2016.
How to invest in Amazon
Investing in Amazon is pretty easy since it's a publicly traded company. You can buy Amazon stock using your brokerage account. Once you've opened and funded your account, you'll need to enter the ticker AMZN, decide how many shares you want to buy, and place your order.
If the price Amazon is trading at seems too high for you, you can buy fractional shares. This allows you to name your price and receive a corresponding fraction of the stock.
You could also invest in Amazon through an exchange-traded fund (ETF) that has exposure to the stock. You can search for an ETF that includes Amazon among its holdings as a way to invest in Amazon without actually buying shares in the company's stock directly.
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