You sweet summer child. CSGO is INSANELY profitable. Valve makes free money on every single cosmetic purchase, and takes a cut of EVER COSMETIC 2ND HAND MARKET SALE OR TRADE.
Specifically 2nd hand sales that take place on their marketplace, which is Valve's own cash store. Players can still do items-for-items trades for free and that powers a lot of third party markets where there is no Valve cut.
