Apple is now more liquid than the United States government, the Financial Post reports. As the government struggles to resolve the debt ceiling debate, the operating balance in Washington is at US$73.768 billion and falling. Meanwhile, Apple has US$75.876 billion.
S&P downgrades US credit rating from AAA to WTF
Actual “cash on hand” for operations is only
$2,769M ($2.7B) per apples SEC disclosure.
They have other investments they used cash to purchase since god know how long including US Bonds, CD, Mutual Funds, Stocks of other companies, etc etc.
I cant beleive why so many missed this. Apple only has $2.7B CASH compared to $74B by the Government.
Apple’s biggest growth happened within the last 3 years. Coincidentally the US took its biggest nose dive in the same time frame.
When Apple can grow this big and this fast in a bad economy you know they’re doing something extremely right.
When a government gets this big and accrues this much debt in such a short amount of time you know its doing something extremely wrong.
Edited 2011-07-29 04:53 UTC
Interesting viewpoint…
Becoming rich quickly means doing the right thing? Always?
What’s about our beloved dictators who are far away from being poor (Even if their citizen are)
What’s about Mafia (Or any other related organisation) who have (or at least had) enough money to rule whole countries???
But I agree with you. Apple is doing one thing right… Marketing!!! The hype around Apple products is totally out of proportion. They certainly have interesting and good products (not more, not less) but their margins are crazy.
Well… It’s not my money. If Apple’s clients are happy with that… I’m happy for them.
May I ask you something? It’s not an aggression or anything you have to get mad about.
But are you mrhasbeen with a new profile??? You have very similar argumentation.
I doubt it. mrhasbean certainly has quite a flawed argumentation, but he has never thrown political bigotry in the mix. He always remained a strictly monotheist priest of the Apple god, as far as this blog is concerned. He also wouldn’t reply to others answering his comments.
A better candidate would be ourcomputerbloke. He exposes all of these characteristics, and the profile was created the day after mrhasbean’s ban.
Thank you for your answer.
I must admit that I don’t know well the OSNews familly.
But learning
He also repeats HasBean’s arguments nearly word for word:
http://www.osnews.com/thread?479450
And he uses the exact same schtick as HasBean, right down the post-and-run strategy & his obsessive need to hump Thom’s leg constantly.
Nope. It means (assuming no illegality) that you did what consumers want. Which may or may not be the moral/ethical right thing.
Edited 2011-07-29 15:25 UTC
All the marketing in the world is useless if it is not backed by quality products and service.
Are you talking about the Reagan years or the W.Bush years?
Sorry no. Since the Dems took office in 2007 the debt has increased 40%. The GOP spent but compared to the 2007-2010 gang they were pikers.
Last GOP budget: 170 billion dollar deficit ( 2006-2007 )
Last Dem budget: 1.7 TRILLION ( 2007-2008 )
Yeah, nice comparison between the deficit made by the GOP during a period of huge economic growth (which turned out to be a bubble) and the the deficit made by the Democrats while trying not to have millions of US citizens turned into homeless beggars in the worst economic downturn in history. Bastard Democrats, such a gang of thugs.
http://i.imgur.com/lKJXT.png
You should check out this chart, and some of the other reporting that James Fallows has been doing on this very topic:
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/07/the-chart-that-…
And this chart:
http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2011/07/24/opinion/sunday/24edito…
Yep. Notice how willing they are to criticize Obama, while never acknowledging that he’s had to try and clean up all the wreckage left behind by Bush while simultaneously contending with a Republican Congress which is so eager to see him fail, they’ll sink the whole economy.
Bullshit numbers pulled out of nowhere.
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2011/07/28/us/charting-the-ameri…
Look at the real numbers and who got the US into its current situation.
Obama just inherited from war-happy Bush a huge national deficit blown out of all proportion caused by its overextended military presence abroad and its fiscal policy of taxing the middle class and the poor while giving huge tax breaks to the very rich.
Of course, Obama had to spend to try to get the US out of the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. But do not forget that this crisis was caused by a financial sector run amok during the Bush years due to lack of regulation. The current situation is the great legacy of the Republican party and the Bush presidency.
Those are the COLD HARD FACTS.
Edited 2011-07-30 17:17 UTC
War Mongering. Thats what’s Uncle Sam is doing.
…and f*** the U.S. Government.
That is all.
Edited 2011-07-29 05:03 UTC
F the current U.S government
The current congress is highly dysfunctional. The current administration is no less dysfunctional than previous administrations. We just see more of what is done now that we did in the past. As this trend continues we will find that it is not government being more evil it is simply the veil of secrecy being lifted.
Thought the veil had been lifted with the Pentagon Papers, the Watergate Commission and the JFK murder investigation.
This may help put the US debt into perspective:
http://www.wtfnoway.com/
So I guess Apple will be running the USA economy soon if they have more cash at hand than the government?
Amazing but scary page.
The government is supposed to have $0 cash. It’s not a for profit organization, it’s the government ffs. wtf is this article comparing Apple to Government? Apple has more than 7 billion times the cash I have in my pocket. But then I am an individual and they are a corporation.
Bah, it’s just a click bait, isn’t it?
Well, I guess any organisation should have some money for unexpected expenses. And any really large organisation, like a country government should probably have a lot.
But why would a publicly trading company like Apple need to keep a lot of money ? They are supposed to share their wealth with their shareholders.
(in a way the citizens of a country are also the shareholders of the government, atleast that is how I look at it)
No, a government needs ‘cash on hand’ to pay it’s bills. You know, to pay social security, the army, all of that other fun stuff.
The USA can have as many cash reserves as they wish to by being able to legally create money (both physical as well as virtual).
I get the feeling the U.S. dollar won’t be worth much if the U.S. defaults on its debt.
No, dude, it can’t. The whole point of the current fiasco is that the US government is not legally able to increase it’s cash position.
If we taxed that at the rate we used to (c. 1960 rates), we wouldn’t have a deficit now.
And if we spent the biggest unit in the deficit (right now and for the next ten years or so, paying our expenditures of the Iraqi/Afghan wars) and put that into science and education and infrastructure, we might have enough of a science- and engineering-based culture to by today have options other than Windows and Apple for our computers, Google and Apple for our phones, and more than one internet/cable provider per city.
There are other options to Windows and OS X for computers and Android and iOS for phones. In fact Android and iOS aren’t even the biggest two phone OSs let alone a joint monopoly (though I admit I’m using global market figures which do vary from the US market specifically)
As for whether there’d be more competition: I doubt so. In any competitive market you’d expect to see a small number of dominant players stand out once the industry has stabilised. The reason being that:
A:- it’s harder for smaller companies to compete against larger companies:
1) they lack the same financial backing for marketing, R&D, and so on,
2) they lack the same patent portfolio,
3) consumers will naturally flock to recognised brands,
4) they have less weight to pull off sales deals (eg brand exclusivity)
B:- smaller companies are often bought out by larger companies.
This is the reason there are anti-competition laws – to ensure that the larger businesses don’t abuse their market position and thus create a market were smaller business have a fair chance to compete. Sadly this doesn’t always work out as well in practice as it should in theory – in my opinion at least.
Edited 2011-07-29 10:18 UTC
You are quite wrong with that. As is said elsewhere, “it’s the spending, stupid.” No time in history has the government collected more than roughly 20% GDP in revenue (taxes, fees, etc). However, the proposed budget for next year is 25+% GDP. Considering this, even taxing at WW-II rates, there is still a 4 percentage point gap of revenue vs spending.
http://usdebt.kleptocracy.us/
Sorry double post which I cannot remove
Edited 2011-07-29 13:08 UTC
I am a US Citizen. And, I think our government must live within its means the same way that many of my fellow citizens do.
I don’t want the US to default. But, I’d rather default than to keep the status quo.
Republicans and Democrats both like to spend money to keep their voters and supporters happy. Republicans want to keep large corporations happy so they will fund their campaigns. Democrats want to shell out money to individuals. It gripes me that the individuals the democrats give money to can afford drugs, alcohol, cigarettes, new cars, 6 kids and cell phones. Corporate welfare gripes me just the same. Both waste money.
I want fiscal sanity to prevail. That’s why I will be supporting candidates for all offices (from local to national) that put fiscal responsibility above all else.
And, when we start cutting spending, let’s start with the wasteful dollars thrown at corporations and individuals who arecapable of working, but choose to live in poverty because it’s free. Let’s eliminate these wastes before we start cutting into medicare and social security.
Yes. There will be pain. But, we can’t keep going like we are going. At some point, somebody is going to have to have the gonads to say, “No more wasteful spending!”.
Edited 2011-07-29 16:17 UTC
I couldn’t believe it myself…
Edited 2011-07-29 20:14 UTC
This post is only about ‘cash (on hand)’. It has nothing to do with market cap.
Correct – my bad. Thanks.
Companies don’t keep banknotes. They keep securities – ie., somebody promises to pay them back.
The article is trying to make a point based on the cost of “Cash and Cash Equivalents” on Apple’s balance sheet at 25 June. Unfortunately over $20bn of that is directly in US Treasury and agency securities, which could get very illiquid very fast if the government starts defaulting.
Even those assets which aren’t directly US government securities are likely to be composed of the same when traced back far enough. Those money market funds, mutual funds, commercial paper and certificates of deposit entries would be shaky.
The reason Apple is in a better position is that it doesn’t need access to credit markets in event of a default. Companies that do need access to short term credit might find themselves falling over.
Seems people were brain washed by the article that suggests Apple has more cash on hand than the US Govt. Malxau, you were the only one that picked this out.. or came close. Kodus…
Actual “cash on hand” for operations is only
$2,769M ($2.7B) per apples SEC disclosure.
They have other investments they used cash to purchase since god know how long including US Bonds, CD, Mutual Funds, Stocks of other companies, etc etc.
I cant beleive why so many missed this.
Here is a somewhat silly cartoon explaining US economy.
but it does it well.. explaining difficult things in a simple way. enjoy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGk5ioEXlIM
A very interesting story.
Now since Apple comments that they have great stores, nice people and gurus maybe it would not be a bad idea to let them run the government. I am sure that they could turn a profit and we would all be required to use Apple only.
I have sure it would be interesting to have to go renew your license, birth records, etc, etc online with Apple or go to a friendly Apple store to do it. It might wake up the government that you don’t need to be rude and obnoxious and people might have to work instead of have the cozy government jobs …
I am sure it would work all over the world but was there not a sci-fi movie like this???
At the very least maybe Steve can offer the government a loan with interest and it sure would be a way to force Microsoft and all else out of the computer business.
Think it would be cool to have an APPLE drivers license, APPLE passport, APPLE secret service, APPLE army, navy, airport, etc, etc .. the APPLE logo everywhere …
I think Steve Jobs for President (when he is available) and since I am from Canada – Steve Jobs for prime minister. Maybe it is high time to run government like a business or hire APPLE as consultants at the least.
Anyways a pipe dream but an interesting diversion for a quite Friday night.