By Alexis Weisend
The Seattle Times
(TNS)
Amazon told Wall Street it received around $600 million in tariff refunds last quarter and plans to pass on some to customers.
The Seattle-based e-commerce giant disclosed the refund in its earnings call with analysts on Thursday, when Amazon announced it beat Wall Street’s expectations with a 20% revenue increase from last year.
The $600 million is one of the largest publicly disclosed payouts since the U.S. Supreme Court struck down President Donald Trump’s sweeping “Liberation Day” tariffs in February, ruling that Trump could not use a rarely invoked act to impose tariffs without congressional approval.
U.S. businesses have paid around $166 billion in duties related to Trump’s “Liberation Day tariffs,” according to court documents. Businesses such as Amazon began applying for refunds in April, when U.S. Customs and Border Protection launched a portal to request reimbursement.
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But Amazon’s refund isn’t as large as some would expect for the nation’s dominant e-commerce company.
That’s because only importers that directly paid the tariffs are eligible for a refund, and most products sold on Amazon are from third-party sellers who handle imports and pay relevant tariffs, Amazon CFO Brian Olsavsky told analysts Thursday.
As for the products where Amazon did buy inventory directly and pay tariffs, the company bought goods in bulk ahead of the tariffs’ effect, he said. When the company did pay tariffs, it “largely absorbed these costs rather than pass them on to customers,” he said.
Olsavsky said Amazon did pass on import charges to customers in a limited set of circumstances.
“When we receive those refunds, we will proactively contact affected customers and automatically issue refunds to them,” Olsavsky said. “Otherwise, like other large retailers, we’ll utilize refunds to continue to invest in low prices for customers.”
Photo credit: Yender Gonzalez/Unsplash
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© 2026 The Seattle Times. Visit www.seattletimes.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency LLC.
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