Jeff Bezos advises entrepreneurs to focus on business fundamentals rather than short-term stock price fluctuations.
Jeff Bezos stated at Italian Tech Week 2025 that founders should prioritize the underlying fundamentals of a business over reacting to daily stock market swings. Reflecting on the dot-com crash, Bezos noted that while Amazon's stock price plummeted, the company's core metrics, such as customer count and gross profits, continued to improve. He emphasized that stock price is an ultimate output with limited control, urging entrepreneurs to focus on building a 'heavy' company with real value. Bezos cited Benjamin Graham's observation that the market acts as a weighing machine in the long term. He also addressed the artificial intelligence boom, noting that speculative periods create lasting infrastructure. Bezos concluded by advising entrepreneurs to remain optimistic, even to the point of delusion, to navigate uncertainty and build lasting value.