Amazon’s share price has surged to a new all-time high on Tuesday, sending the ecommerce giant’s market cap beyond $1.1 trillion during intraday trade for the first time.
Stock in the Seattle-based mega-corp traded for more than $2,280 on Tuesday afternoon. This beats Amazon’s previous price record of $2,170.22 by 5%, which CNBC notes was set in February.
[Read: Amazon warehouse worker tests positive for coronavirus day after Bezos visit]
The coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has brought unprecedented demand to Amazon, with social distancing measures pushing huge swathes of people towards buying essentials like groceries and medicine online.
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Amazon has announced its hiring as many as 175,000 additional staff to keep up, and has even begun developing in-house COVID-19 testing labs to better track the disease as it spreads through its warehouses. It also pledged to raise warehouse wages by $2 (or 2 euros) for hours worked in April.
While traders have certainly shown their confidence in Amazon and CEO Jeff Bezos, their most-recent success has not been free of growing pains.
A steady stream of disgruntled workers have alleged unsafe working conditions in the midst of worsening COVID-19 outbreaks (but to be fair, Amazon workers have been sharing nightmarish stories for years).
Controversy also surrounds the dismissal of one worker who organized an employee protest for better treatment — a matter which the New York human-rights watchdog is now investigating, ordered by the city’s mayor.
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