What the AMZN scenario measures
Enter a USD amount and date range to estimate a single buy-and-hold investment using the provider's available daily closing prices. It is a price-return scenario, not an account statement, trading strategy backtest or prediction. Fractional holdings are assumed, and the result excludes commissions, spread, slippage, taxes, borrowing costs and additional deposits or withdrawals.
Choose the interval and inspect the actual dates
- Enter a positive finite amount up to $1 trillion.
- Choose a start date on or after Amazon's IPO and an end date no later than today. Select Calculate Return.
- Read the actual first and last returned dates. Weekends, holidays and provider gaps can shorten the interval; the tool does not fetch outside it to find a nearest date.
- Compare results only after checking the same endpoint dates, currency and return basis. Recalculate after changing an input.
Stock splits change units, not wealth by themselves
Amazon's investor FAQ reports a May 15, 1997 IPO price of $18 and post-IPO splits of 2-for-1, 3-for-1, 2-for-1 and 20-for-1. Their combined factor is 240, making the IPO offering price $0.075 on that adjusted basis. The offering price is not the first day's closing price or a price every investor could obtain.
The selected FMP endpoint supplies split-adjusted prices. Dividing the investment by that adjusted start price produces adjusted-share-equivalent units; it does not reconstruct the original pre-split share count. Applying the split factor again would double-count it. Confirm the provider basis when comparing a downloaded price with an older brokerage statement.
Price return and CAGR answer different questions
Price return
(End close / Start close − 1) × 100. This percentage uses the two actual returned closes and excludes cash distributions and costs.
Annualized price return
((End close / Start close)^(365.25 / elapsed days) − 1) × 100. Short intervals can produce extreme annualized values; the rate is not a forecast or risk measure.
A constructed calculation
For hypothetical adjusted closes of $100 and $120, an investment of $1,000 represents 10 adjusted-share units and ends at $1,200, a 20% price gain before costs. These are illustrative inputs, not an AMZN performance claim. Over different holding periods the same 20% gain produces different annualized rates; it does not establish which path was safer.
Dividend policy is separate from the calculation
This page does not model dividend cash flows or reinvestment, regardless of a company's current policy. Check Amazon's latest investor disclosures for that policy. Price return and total return are different concepts; they should not be treated as interchangeable for all dates or all stocks.
Check the limits before using a result
The chart samples at most 200 observations for display, so it can miss intermediate declines. CAGR also hides the path. Historical coverage depends on the provider and access level; requesting the IPO date does not prove the series starts there. Results use end-of-day prices and are not a live liquidation value.