Apple becomes the first $1T company • Hacker News Board

Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#141

Post by jandrese » Thu, Aug 02, 2018, 5:00 PM UTC

com2kid wrote: post #106

mikekij wrote: post #25

"A $600 phone?! Who's going to buy a $600 phone?!" -Steve Balmer

I worked in Windows Mobile at the time. He was just quoting what the best market researchers had told him. We were given a LOT of market research papers with in-depth customer surveys where lots of people said, repeatedly, that they would "never pay money for a phone". If you think back to then, phones were "free" with a 2 year contract. The idea of getting someone who was used to free to switch over to $600 overnigh…

The original iPhone pricing was really baffling. Had it not been a really revolutionary device it would have flopped IMHO.

You paid $600 for the phone, and then AT&T added the phone subsidy to your bill anyway (and never took it off), so it was just stupendously expensive. Apple lowered the price pretty soon after launch.

It was worth it to have a browser on a phone that wasn't total dogshit.

Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#142

Post by kolbe » Thu, Aug 02, 2018, 5:01 PM UTC

reaperducer wrote: post #103

onion2k wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're not free. They just don't cost money . Arguably they're very expensive.

They're not free. They just don't cost money. Arguably they're very expensive. This is a distinction most people don't grasp. I didn't, myself, until recently when a briefing from the legal department resulted in scouring the word "free" from eight web sites and replacing the word with "at no cost."

It really depends on how susceptible the particular user is to the cost of being a part Google's ad network. If Google's ad network intelligently informs you to make better consumer decisions, then you can argue that you get paid to use Google's services. But unfortunately, too many people derive extreme negative value from being a part of it by being manipulated into making decisions that harm their lives. Even poorer people could easily be paying thousands of dollars in cost to their health (sugary drink and alcohol ads), bank account (financial scam ads), and community destruction (political misinformation ads).

Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#143

Post by a5huynh » Thu, Aug 02, 2018, 5:02 PM UTC

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #74

maxshmax wrote: post #68

It's worth noting that this is the first U.S. company to hit $1 trillion, not in the world. Also, it's still intraday, so Apple has not technically reached that point yet.

> this is the first U.S. company to hit $1 trillion What's the other one?

I believe Saudi Aramco and PetroChina have passed the $1T mark.

Historically, adjusting for inflation there are also some really big ones: https://www.fool.com/investing/general/2012/08/22/a-history-...

Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#144

Post by Fomite » Thu, Aug 02, 2018, 5:02 PM UTC

GlenTheMachine wrote: post #35

I went to grad school with a guy who, the day Apple stock hit $14 a share, decided to spend $500 of his grad student stipend to buy some. He figured Apple's cash on hand was worth more than $14 a share. I thought he was nuts. I was an idiot.

I bought some at about the same time. With splits, my cost basis is less than $1/share, and my % return is well north of 20,000%.

Apple stock was the downpayment on my house.

Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#145

Post by KaoruAoiShiho » Thu, Aug 02, 2018, 5:02 PM UTC

Is Samsung Electronics ridiculously undervalued or what? It generates more profit than Apple https://wccftech.com/samsung-posted-higher-profit-than-apple... yet is valued at only $290 billion instead of $1000 billion. What the heck.

Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#146

Post by penagwin » Thu, Aug 02, 2018, 5:03 PM UTC

trumped wrote: post #59

bepotts wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's legal to find ways to reduce your tax burden.

the tax system should be made simpler... no loopholes (I know it is probably not easy to accomplish, but worth a try) ... because middle class can't afford to avoid taxes like the rich does it.

That's simply not possible. The IRS themselves state that "tax evasion" is illegal, but "tax avoidance" isn't. A "loophole" is the use of deductibles to lower the amount you pay in taxes, that you choose to try to get.

For example, you could get lower taxes by "getting married", even if you're just friends you can get lower tax rates, etc. That's a "loophole". Are we supposed to prove they "really wanted to get married"? Now apply that to potentially all deductables.....

Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#147

Post by scarface74 » Thu, Aug 02, 2018, 5:03 PM UTC

mikekij wrote: post #25

"A $600 phone?! Who's going to buy a $600 phone?!" -Steve Balmer

He was right. Hardly anyone did buy a $600 phone. Apple had to reduce the price within 6 months, the next year Apple and AT&T did the standard subsidization model.

Now even Apple offers a payment plan.

Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#148

Post by scarface74 » Thu, Aug 02, 2018, 5:04 PM UTC

com2kid wrote: post #139

bosdev wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Consumers are just as bad at predicting the future as everyone else. Market research is great for making iterative improvements or learning what people are frustrated with, but it's data, not knowledge, and definitely not prognostication.

This is incredibly true, a huge lesson from the iPhone is that consumers can not tell you what they cannot imagine. Creating entirely new markets takes vision.

They should have learned that lesson from the iPod - “No wireless, less space than a Nomad, Lame”

Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#149

Post by chickenbane » Thu, Aug 02, 2018, 5:05 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #54

Good for it. Becoming a trillion dollar company selling quality products people love. Not data mining everything about your life and using it for advertising (Google), ruthlessly destroying competition (Microsoft), or destroying the environment (Exxon). How old fashioned.

I'm an Apple fan - congratulations to Apple - but on the other hand Apple being the biggest company in the world is pretty uninspiring. After seeing Tesla build a mass market electric car factory, or SpaceX launching a Roadster into space, a company with hundreds of billions of dollars in the bank making phones and headphones feels like a wasted opportunity.

Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#150

Post by jandrese » Thu, Aug 02, 2018, 5:06 PM UTC

ryanmercer wrote: post #21

sna1l wrote: post #8

First public trillion dollar company, right? Source: http://www.visualcapitalist.com/most-valuable-companies-all-...

I guess you missed where that infographic says "inf. adjusted". Regardless of inflation adjusted or not, Dutch East India shouldn't be considered given their rampant use of slave labor. doing a lot of business off of slave trade (pretty easy to make money when you're kidnapping people and sailing them across an ocean then selling them), having a nearly absolute monopoly, and uh... being government backed.

Kind of arbitrary to exclude a company because it uses slave labor or other immoral practices. Your list of giant multinationals would be very short indeed. No textile producers for example except for some tiny boutique shops. No petrochemcial companies at all. No agribusiness. Modern society is built on the suffering of the poor and disenfranchised.