Amazon.com Inc. ( NASDAQ: AMZN) has been one of the stock market's biggest success stories ever. The company had its initial public offering in May 1997 and traded for an astonishingly low split-adjusted price of just seven cents per share. Since then, the stock has gained over 299,600% as the company has grown into the linchpin of e-commerce. Since its inception, Amazon has become a mainstay in the Magnificent 7 and now commands the fourth-largest market cap of any publicly traded company.