I think that's a mischaracterization. It's not short term profits, it's short term performance. Amazon and Tesla are still evaluated quarter-to-quarter, and if they stumbled in their growth numbers they'd still get killed.
Hmm, but people also say "the market is forward looking". It's quite clear Wall Street loves growth (over the last decade, at least) and isn't at all obsessed with short-term profits.
There is a massive almost limitless supply of money at the moment, and you cannot put it into a savings account so you have to bring it to the stock markets.