Go Lean Commentary
For the planned entity, Caribbean Postal Union, the question should be asked:
What do you want to be when you grow up?
The answer should be:
Amazon
It turns out that Amazon was only founded in 1999, so this is less than 20 years. It is that quickly that an enterprise can have a transformative effect on society. We need transformations in the Caribbean and we are hoping to follow the Amazon business model as the solution for our regional postal-logistical needs.
How successful is Amazon as a model for success?
Well, now Amazon market capitalization has exceeded $1 Trillion. See the VIDEO and news story here:
VIDEO – Amazon 2nd company to top $1 trillion valuation – https://www.usatoday.com/videos/tech/nation-now/2018/09/05/amazon-2nd-company-top-1-trillion-valuation/37720169/
Sep 4, 2018 – Amazon has become the 2nd publicly traded company to be worth $1 trillion, after Apple. Amazon has cemented customer loyalty through its devices and fast, free shipping as well as music and video streaming perks. AP
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Title – Amazon’s stock value tops $1 trillion, joins Apple in trillionaire club
Amazon’s meteoric stock surge briefly pushed its market value above $1 trillion, a milestone that makes the online retail giant only the second publicly traded company in the U.S. to pass that mark – following Apple.
Amazon topped $1 trillion for the first time Tuesday when its shares climbed past $2,050.27 in late-morning trading and hit an intraday record high of $2,050.50. Shares pulled back to $2,039.51 for a gain of 1.3 percent for the day.
The accomplishment comes after Amazon’s per-share price crossed $2,000 for the first time last week.
Under CEO Jeff Bezos, who is now the richest person in the world with a net worth of an estimated $166 billion, Amazon has emerged as the most powerful force in the e-commerce business, capturing roughly 50 percent of the online retail market, according to eMarketer.
But it’s not just Amazon’s disruptive force in retail that has attracted investors on Wall Street. The company has diversified its sales and profit streams, from a public cloud-computing business to paid subscription services like Amazon Prime, and advertising revenue on its website.
Some Wall Street pros see the stock climbing even higher.
Citing Amazon’s improving business mix, rapid growth and profit potential, Morgan Stanley analyst Brian Nowak last week upped his price target for Amazon shares to $2,500, which is the highest on Wall Street, according to Bloomberg. If that fresh target is reached, it would boost the company’s market capitalization to more than $1.2 trillion.
In the race for most valuable U.S. company, Amazon now trails Apple by roughly $100 billion.
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See the rest of the news article in the Appendix below.
This one company is worth US$1 Trillion. The whole Caribbean’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is [far] less; it is our plan to elevate the economic engines in the region to get the economy’s output up to $800 Billion.
Amazon is a model for e-Commerce, logistics, media and innovation. This is the role model we want for our Caribbean Postal Union and the aligning online portal, www.myCaribbean.gov. It is good to have a roadmap to follow to duplicate the successful journey of Amazon.
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as such a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) and the Caribbean Postal Union (CPU). These entities are designed to address the “Agents of Change“ in modern society, but for a Caribbean scope only. The “Agents of Change” at play in the foregoing news sources, according to the book (Page 57), are defined as follows:
- Technology
- Globalization
Asking the question: “What I want to be when I grow up?” is emblematic of future planning. This exercise is important for the region if we truly want to have a future. Though our people may survive, such an eventuality is not guaranteed for our culture. Ghost Towns do happen!
Our Caribbean region cannot continue with the status quo in terms of business operations and societal outworking. We must now reboot our industrial landscape to foster new opportunities (jobs, entrepreneurism and industrial development). This is the charter of the Caribbean Postal Union effort. In fact, the following 3 statements are identified as the prime directives of this CU charter:
- Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
- Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
- Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.
In a previous Go Lean blog-commentary, it was related that …
… what Amazon did and does, is the epitome of what the CU/CPU needs to do to reboot Caribbean society. The company disrupted the status quo in so many industries – think: book retailers & movie rentals – and transformed markets to exploit opportunities and derive profits. This is the “Sum of All Caribbean Dreams“.
This reference to Caribbean Dreams is presented early in the Go Lean book with these opening pronouncements in the Declaration of Interdependence (Page 13 and 14):
xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.
xxvii. Whereas the region has endured a spectator status during the Industrial Revolution, we cannot stand on the sidelines of this new economy, the Information Revolution. Rather, the Federation must embrace all the tenets of Internet Communications Technology (ICT) to serve as an equalizing element in competition with the rest of the world. The Federation must bridge the digital divide and promote the community ethos that research/development is valuable and must be promoted and incentivized for adoption.
Monitoring and analyzing the business model of Amazon has been a frequent occupation for these Go Lean blog-commentaries; consider these previous submissions, as follows:
| http://www.goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14316 | Forging Change: Soft Power – Clean-up or ‘Adios Amazon’
Amazon is proving that people and communities will be motivated to change in order to have the prospect of acquiring money or to prevent losing money. This “soft power” is now emerging as the preferred way to forge change on society. The summary statement is: “Clean-up your societal defects or else … face the loss of an economic bonanza”. |
| http://www.goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14191 | Scheduling in the ‘Gig Economy’
Amazon is proving that there is always “honorable” work available in the service industry. Any reference to the Post Office of 1987 can now be replaced with the Gig Economy. Amazon is very prominent in the Gig Economy in the US. |
| http://www.goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13627 | Amazon: Then and Now
It has only been 18 years ago (1999 – 2017) since Amazon launched in Seattle, Washington USA. Now today, they are huge … and transforming how America shops … and consume media; even their digital assistant – Alexa – is transformative. |
| http://www.goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13091 | Amazon Opens Search for HQ2 Amazon is accepting bids for a 2nd headquarters in North America. The city that lands HQ2 will have a lot to celebrate, as this enterprise can create many high-paying direct jobs – 50,000 – and have an indirect stimulus on the rest of the economy. This is a feature of Amazon that “we” want to model in the Caribbean. |
| http://www.goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12291 | Big Tech’s Amazon – The Retailers’ Enemy Big Tech companies like Amazon have the treasuries, talent and temperament (culture, values and commitment) to change the world, for good and for bad. The Amazon threat had been “all things internet”, but now they are attempting to dominate the physical retail space as well, with their acquisition of Whole Foods grocery stores. |
| http://www.goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=11358 | Retail Apocalypse – Preparing for the Inevitable There is feast and famine “in the cards” for the retail eco-system. On one end of the spectrum , there will be prosperity for electronic commerce stakeholders, but on the other end, for brick-and-mortar establishments, there will be a Retail Apocalypse. This is not just a future problem as the threat has already manifested! |
| http://www.goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=9839 | Alibaba and Amazon’s Cloud allows for global reach This model, with cutting-edge data centers, is the new colonialism. |
| http://www.goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7297 | Death of the ‘Department Store’: Exaggerated or Eventual Modern technology and electronic commerce has transformed many aspects of society; much has been added and much taken away. Just consider: cameras, watches, pagers, maps, calculators, calendars, payphones, books, music and more. The related industries have also been affected: travel agencies, music retailers, book retailers, newspapers, travel agencies and Big Box retailers. Amazon is to blame for many of the transformations. |
| http://www.goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7023 | Thanksgiving & American Commerce – Past, Present and Amazon To better understand American commerce, one must understand Cyber Monday and its dominant player Amazon. This company demonstrates how to be lean and technocratic as it employs cutting-edge automation and robotics. They are a great model for a new Caribbean. |
| http://www.goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1416 | Model of an E-Commerce Fulfillment Company: Amazon Amazon is the model for the Caribbean Postal Union (CPU): our means for delivering the mail. Considering the US, one might think that the American model would be the US Postal Service (USPS). No, the Go Lean book relates how the USPS is a failing enterprise, while Amazon flourishes with growth, capital and profits. |
One Trillion Dollars …
… this sounds great! This is what is meant by the old encouragement: Reach for the stars!
Can we pursue such a quest in the new Caribbean?
Yes, we can!
Consolidating and integrating the existing postal agencies in the Caribbean, should be “low hanging fruit”. Currently, these entities are just inefficient, ineffective cost centers, but here is the opportunity to transform them to this new vision: the CPU functioning as a job-creating profit center.
We cannot ignore this win-win possibility.
We hereby urge all Caribbean stakeholders to lean-in to the empowerments in the Go Lean/CU/CPU roadmap. Whether we pursue this roadmap to make a trillion dollars or just to optimize the mail, the end-result will be a positive benefit. This quest can make our homeland a better place to live, work and play. 🙂
Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!
Sign the petition to lean-in for the roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.
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Appendix – Amazon’s stock value tops $1 trillion, joins Apple in trillionaire club – Cont’d
By: Adam Shell, USA TODAY
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Amazon’s stock, which is up nearly 75 percent this year, has been one of Wall Street’s top performers in the bull market that began in March 2009, gaining more than 3,000 percent, according to S&P Dow Jones Indices.
Amazon is also pushing into new businesses, such as groceries, a move highlighted by its purchase last year of upscale grocer Whole Foods Market for $13.7 billion. It also entered the health care space in June, with the purchase of online pharmacy PillPack.
The only other U.S. stocks within striking distance of a $1 trillion market value are Microsoft and Google-parent Alphabet, both of which are valued at roughly $850 billion.
Tuna Amobi, an analyst at Wall Street firm CFRA, sees Amazon’s stock price rising as high as $2,200 a share. Amazon’s suite of businesses, he says, act as “building blocks” that give it a diversified stream of revenue and will help it deliver “consistent” earnings results in the quarters ahead. “A lot of investments are starting to pay off,” he says.
Still, like any stock, Amazon is not risk free. Despite reporting a profit of $2.5 billion on $52.9 billion in sales in the quarter ended in June, and forecasting year-over-year sales growth of 23 percent to 31 percent in the current quarter, Amazon is not a cheap stock.
It currently trades at nearly 100 times its expected earnings over the next 12 months, which is about five times the broad market’s price-to-earnings ratio of 21, according to Bloomberg.
Another potential risk that could derail Amazon is a potential regulatory crackdown from Washington, D.C., which could look to counter its clout in online retailing, Amobi says.
Amazon is one of the popular and strong-performing “FAANG” stocks – Facebook, Apple, Netflix and Google parent Alphabet are the others – that have come under increased scrutiny from President Donald Trump and lawmakers because of their growing dominance. Executives from Facebook and Twitter will testify Wednesday before the Senate Intelligence Committee regarding interference of foreign nations on social-media platforms.
Amazon also faces increasing competition in online retailing from big players like Walmart and Target that are fighting to regain lost market share. It is also facing challenges from Microsoft and Google in the competitive cloud-computing business.
Source: USA Today – Posted September 4, 2018; retrieved October 1, 2018 from: https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2018/09/04/amazon-tops-1-trillion-market-value/1191141002/?csp=chromepush