Amazon’s Jeff Bezos is tough to bet against: Investor Joel Greenblatt

Amazon reportedly raked in more than $5.6 billion in U.S. profits in 2017 and recorded 11 straight profitable quarters under the company’s founder and CEO Jeff Bezos.

“Amazon's run by a pretty special guy and tough to bet against him.  It's also tough to come up with a valuation, so some businesses you put in the too hard file, you're not exactly sure and what kind of premium they're worth, it's not infinite, but Amazon is a unicorn that I don't want to speculate on,” Gotham Asset Management managing principal Joel Greenblatt said during an interview on “Maria Bartiromo’s Wall Street Week.”

Greenblatt, who is attending the Forbes•SHOOK Top Advisors Summit in Las Vegas this week, said the e-commerce giant is a household name for investors.

“You can pick out the few diamonds in the rough, and Amazon, my bet would be one of those and everyone knows that name, but it gets people speculating at other names that aren't quite as good a business and throwing caution to the wind there and I think that's where you get hurt mostly,” he said.

Bezos, the richest person in the world with a net worth of $105 billion, is in the midst of a nationwide hunt for a second Amazon headquarters locale. The company plans to invest more than $5 billion in construction costs and create at least 50,000 high-paying jobs in the selected city, which has been narrowed down to 20 contenders.