I was interested by this, so I checked.

It's indeed near it's all-time high. Though this is not surprising, it's the case for many companies that aren't dwindling currently, and that didn't have huge peaks around 2000.

But to say it's had a 22% annual return since 2000 is a bit of a misrepresentation. The overall return between 2000 and 2018, divided over the 18 years, might be 22% YoY (not sure, I didn't check -- could well be that it's not). But it's had a number of years with negative returns (e.g. 2015), certainly not 22% returns.

Edit: I checked. A yearly 22% growth from 2000 to today would put it quite a bit higher than its current stock price. So it's not a 22% YoY growth.

I also think that Amazon is a really bad example. Not only are they growing at a phenomenal rate, but they have been profitable for a few years. The markets would not have tolerated their unprofitability if there wasn't also a pretty clear direction for becoming a profitable business.

Of course, the financial press does a terrible job of explaining these things.

Amazon is a good example because they aren't hostage to the capital markets...they are not consumers of capital, though their reported profits are pathetic in comparison to their market cap. Bezos hasn't gone on an earnings call in...I don't know, maybe forever.

When your business doesn't need to raise money, you have a license to run it like a private company. The vast majority don't, but there are reasons for that, too.