How Apple's phantom taxes hide billions in profit

[amirm]

Ah, no problem Tim .

Looks like Apple sneezed a bit in this quarter with iPhone results. Stock is down 5%. They have a lot of wind behind them assuming next quarter will be a good one when iPhone 5 comes out.

 

[Phelonious Ponk]

Ah, no problem Tim .

Looks like Apple sneezed a bit in this quarter with iPhone results. Stock is down 5%. They have a lot of wind behind them assuming next quarter will be a good one when iPhone 5 comes out.

I'm afraid the wind behind them may be shorter than it has been in a long time. There's a backlog of product development and a focus, now, mostly in generational improvements on existing breakthroughs. When it's time to do, again, what has got them where they are -- take a promising underdeveloped technology a huge leap forward in utility, ease of use and consumer appeal, take over a category then grow it massively -- I wonder if they can do it without the kind of driven, focused leadership they had under Jobs. The guy had his issues, but the systemic mediocrity of the publicly-traded company was not on the short list. He ran a corp with the vision, focus and risk of a sole proprietorship.

Not something most CEOs can pull off.

Tim

 

[amirm]

There is already changes in that regard where the complete secrecy is gone with hints of new products and such.

There is also the thing that caught up with Microsoft which was the law of large numbers. There can't be exponential growth year after year forever.

 

[rblnr]

Yet once the roads crumble or nature (or man) strikes we first look toward the Government ... You think a government will be able to help a growing population facing various and ever more serious threats, growing needs with less or dwindling revenues? Such rhetoric will never cease to amaze me.

I agree with Tim by the way...

Yep. I'm with Tim and Frantz. But I've never been clear on what freedoms the govt. is taking away from me or Europeans for that matter. Just got back from Scandanavia and they seem a pretty happy, prosperous bunch despite higher corporate taxes and the like.

As for Apple and growth, we'll see. Smartphone market still has a lot of growth left here and globally as do tablets apparently. People tend to turn these devices over with much greater frequency than, say, computers too. And with increasing iCloud integration across all devices (the biggest part of Mountain Lion along w/eased sharing), the ecosystem keeps getting stickier.

We'll see what they come up with in the TV space as well. Apple has has a disproportionately high percentage of the educational and 14 - 22 yo mkt. which bodes well for future growth too.