President Donald Trump, in his crusade against tech behemoth Amazon and its CEO Jeff Bezos this week took another jab at "their Delivery Boy", the United States Postal Service.
White House spokesman Raj Shah said in a TV interview Thursday that Trump's tweets are not about Bezos, but that mom-and-pop shops and brick-and-mortar stores are having trouble competing with fast-growing Amazon.
Cloudtail, appointed a senior Amazon executive Sumit Sahay as its CEO past year, is the most important seller for Amazon in India and the company relies heavily on it to push top selling categories.
The retailer does pay taxes, both state and local, where it's required to do so-though it's true to say that it didn't always.
Amazon did not initially collect state sales taxes when it began selling books online in 1995.
"There's a lot of things where the federal government can do real damage to any business, and that's precisely why we don't want the president to attack individual companies, certainly not for political reasons", said Stan Veuger, an expert on politics and finance at the conservative American Enterprise Institute.
In a 2017 statement, Amazon said that its partnership with the Postal Service was "reviewed annually by the Postal Regulatory Commission", which found its contracts to be profitable.
A Supreme Court ruling favouring South Dakota could funnel up to $13 billion (£9.3 billion) annually of new tax revenues into the coffers of affected US states, according to a 2017 federal government report.
"If I become president, oh do they have problems", Trump said at a campaign stop in 2016. The development comes at a time when the local arm of the Seattle-based company has been faced with issues from several of the third-party sellers, especially the ones who do not use the e-commerce major's Fulfilled By Amazon (FBA) service.
Laura Ingraham Apologizes for Tweet About Parkland Survivor After Advertisers Drop Her
Nestle , Wayfair , Expedia , Nutrish and TripAdvisor have left the show, according to reports. "(Dinged by UCLA with a 4.1 GPA.totally predictable given acceptance rates)".
Mega Millions numbers: 11, 28, 31, 46, 59, Mega Ball 1
When asked what he would do if finding himself the victor of the mega Millions jackpot, his answer was surprising. And when there's this much on the line, he's also trying to convince friends and family members to buy tickets.
Saudis, SoftBank Announce World's Largest Solar Power Project
Saudi Arabia also plans to build at least 16 nuclear reactors in the next 25 years at a cost of more than 80 billion Dollars . Saudi Arabia has signed a memorandum of understanding with Softbank Group to set up the world's largest solar project.
The online retailer has been continuously adding products which are ready to be shipped for next day or two day deliveries.
As for the Postal Service, it has lost money for years, but online shopping has led to growth in its package-delivery business.
With this, the Amazon shares fell about 4.4 percent on Wednesday.
Trump is no fan of Amazon, and he often broadcasts this on Twitter. "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!" he tweeted.
"If there is a law that regulates how you tax third-party sellers, it's going to apply to everyone and Amazon's position will remain the same", said Steve Chiavarone, a portfolio manager at Federated Investors.
The reality, however, is that Amazon has little to do with why USPS has been bleeding red ink.
"Though imperfect, the deal is mutually beneficial", said the The Wall Street Journal editorial board. In 2017, the loss was $2.74 billion.
"During the previous five years, Amazon reported US profits of $8.2 billion and paid an effective federal income tax rate of just 11.4 percent", wrote Matthew Gardner, an ITEP senior fellow. "So has Starbucks, Barnes & Noble, Kroger and any other superstore that took share from small businesses". On Feb. 15, speaking at a hearing before the House Ways and Means Committee, Mnuchin said he had spoken personally with Trump about online taxation, and that the president "does feel strongly" that sales tax should be applied to internet purchases.
Trump has a long history of animosity toward Amazon Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos, who also owns the Washington Post, and the president previously has aired these complaints. "It's really about policy".
