Amazon received $600 million in tariff refunds during the second quarter, a figure disclosed only after a class-action lawsuit accused the company of forgoing such reimbursements to curry favor with President Donald Trump.
The refunds, detailed by Chief Financial Officer Brian Olsavsky on Thursday's earnings call, represent a fraction of the tariffs paid on goods sold through Amazon's platform. Olsavsky said the total was limited because Amazon forward-bought inventory to avoid tariff costs and because the company is not the importer of record for the large majority of items in its store, third-party sellers, who account for more than 60 percent of goods sold, typically handle imports themselves.
The disclosure came three months after consumers filed suit in federal court in Seattle, arguing they were owed refunds for tariff-inflated prices and alleging Amazon's silence on the refund process was strategic. Amazon had declined for months to say whether it would pursue the refunds available under the Trump administration's emergency tariff powers.
Olsavsky said Amazon will automatically reimburse customers in a "limited set of circumstances" where it can trace specific import charges passed through to the final price. Refunds that cannot be linked to individual purchases will be used to "continue to invest in low prices for customers," he said, the same treatment other large retailers apply.
The company's posture on tariffs has shifted. In January, Chief Executive Andy Jassy said tariffs were beginning to push up prices on the platform as pre-stocked inventory ran out. He noted that retail's mid-single-digit operating margins leave little room to absorb cost increases of 10 percent or more. A year earlier, Jassy had said prices had not risen appreciably after the tariffs were first announced.
Many third-party sellers, facing the same tariffs, raised prices and have since applied for their own refunds. The seller refund process runs separately from Amazon's.
The scope of automatic consumer refunds will depend on how many purchases Amazon can link directly to tariff charges it passed through. The company did not estimate how many customers would receive payments or the total amount it expects to return.