Apple's 2012 profits forecast to be highest of any public company ever - Page 3

Quote:

Originally Posted by melgross 


I don't think he meant that PC sales would totally dry up. But the PC market is certainly going to shrink. It may shrink a lot over the next several years. Eventually, it may shrink so much that many PC vendors may stop making them.

I agree. But in Apple's case, their iOS devices are terrific 'gateway' products for people to check out the rest of the hardware ecosystem, i.e., Macs.

Quote:

Originally Posted by BUSHMAN4 

Apple poised to post highest profit and revenue ever thanks to the perfect storm. As we see Apple has just released new hardware with more to follow, the New Ihone 5 coming  this fall, a possible new TV or Ipanel, new operating systems for mobile and land............lets face it, it doesn't get any better than this. (I forgot to mention Apples upcoming deal with China Mobile)

 

My question is what does Apple do for an encore.

Steve Ballmer would give up his Monkey dance to know the answer to that question. 

Apple's entry into the music player business was greeted with scoff, as they came in late with a more expensive product. Ballmer howled with laughter when he heard Apple was entering the phone market with a high-priced phone... a market MS had been in for years. The tablet market could never gain market traction until Apple came out with their iPad. THEN, Apple refused to sit still and has annually improved their products in incremental steps, keeping the competition slightly off balance. Apple has "first mover advantage" and have kept the pressure up to hold that position. In chess, that's called the initiative and shows which player is running the game. By not telegraphing their next move, Apple's competitors cannot anticipate or prepare for the next big thing.

Quote:

Originally Posted by BUSHMAN4 

My question is what does Apple do for an encore.

• Remind yourself where Apple derives revenue. Hardware.

  
  
• Look at current trends across Apple product lines:
• Resolutionary products (Retina Display (and beyond since the MacBook Pro with Retina Display far surpasses the Apple definition of Retina Display)
• Thinnovation (remove legacy detritus and trend toward Solid State Drives)

  
  
• Don't forget that supply chains are an anchor for Apple's success.

  
  
• Don't get your head out of the iClouds.

  
  
• Never take life too Siri-ously.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dick Applebaum 

 

From the perspective of a [former] business owner selling Apple products.

 

What you say has a greater advantage than only the profit $.  

 

You and your $100 customer have a $50 relationship -- that is understood and appreciated by each party.   

 

Your competitor has a $10 relationship, each, with 5 parties -- understood by each, for what it is worth.

 

You are selling solutions, relationships, repeat business, reference sales...

 

Your competitor is selling price.

In addition to all of the above, the business owner and the manufacturer have fewer but profitable customers to support, which lowers your operating costs. 

One profitable customer vs. six customers, as in the above example. Besides, everyone knows that if it has power cords or tits, you're gonna have problems to resolve. :-)

Quote:

Originally Posted by BUSHMAN4 

Apple poised to post highest profit and revenue ever thanks to the perfect storm. As we see Apple has just released new hardware with more to follow, the New Ihone 5 coming  this fall, a possible new TV or Ipanel, new operating systems for mobile and land............lets face it, it doesn't get any better than this. (I forgot to mention Apples upcoming deal with China Mobile)

My question is what does Apple do for an encore.

iTV, followed by iCar, and then, the pièce de Resistance: I, Robot!

I repeat my yearly prediction: the first non-living co-respondent in a divorce proceeding will be an Apple FemBot!!!

Quote:

Originally Posted by melgross 


Can you link to the "questioned" statements you say you've read? I haven't seen any.
Whether you believe it or not is irrelevant.

http://www.businessinsider.com/apparently-no-one-told-chrysler-that-its-supposed-to-build-siri-into-its-cars-2012-6

http://www.fastcompany.com/1840149/driving-miss-siri-inside-apple-iphone-integration-with-mercedes-benz-bmw-general-motors?partner=gnews

Quote:

Originally Posted by Flaneur 


The wild card in the deck, unseen in this negative view, is the next phase of the portable computer revolution, which is just getting started. I'm not going to say what it is because you don't deserve to know. Even if you were told, you wouldn't understand.
The main point is that there is no bubble this time. We are seeing a new industry establishing right before our eyes—if they're open, that is.

No doubt you're so clever you can see into the future from that high horse you're sitting on.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shaun, UK 

 

http://www.businessinsider.com/apparently-no-one-told-chrysler-that-its-supposed-to-build-siri-into-its-cars-2012-6

 

http://www.fastcompany.com/1840149/driving-miss-siri-inside-apple-iphone-integration-with-mercedes-benz-bmw-general-motors?partner=gnews

First I'd seen of that. Thanks for the links.

Quote:

Originally Posted by jragosta 


I don't think so. Their revenues are considerably less than half of Exxon's ($185 B vs $485 B):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudi_Aramco
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ExxonMobil
Exxon's net income was $41 B - or roughly 8% of revenues. Saudi Aramco would have to have net income of 60% of revenues to reach $100 B. That just doesn't seem likely.

Exxon pumps about 2.5M bpd, while Saudi pumps ~7.5M (you can find this info very easily on the web; the 7.5M number is probably an underestimate for Saudi). The correct metric to use to infer revenues from bpd is to look at the "revenue equivalent" from production of oil, natural gas and other products. If we use Exxon's multiples (as you did), Saudi's revenue must be closer to $1.4 trillion, or something in that range. 8% of that is over $100B.

It is commonly acknowledged that Saudi Aramco is the largest oil and gas producer in the world (although, they may have been eclipsed by PetroChina, hard to tell).

Quote:

Originally Posted by jragosta 

Where in the original article did they use discounted cash flows? Hint: they didn't. I don't care if they use discounted figures or inflation adjusted figures since you get roughly the same result. The point is that you can't compare a past market cap (or revenues or profit dollars) to current ones without an adjustment for inflation.
You certainly could compare PE ratios - but that's not what was being compared. Nor is it valid to compare PE ratios when the discussion is about "which company has the greater market cap".

Every valuation is implicitly or explicitly a DCF valuation. If it is not explicitly a DCF valuation it's likely a relative valuation based on multiples (i.e., EPS*[P/E], which is an implicit DCF valuation). In either event, my two points about valuations being independent of inflation are right -- i.e., the point about nominal cash flows discounted at the nominal discount rate being the same as valuations based on real -- i.e., inflation-adjusted --  cash flows discounted at the real discount rate numbers for both, and the point about P/E ratios being independent of inflation.

Moreover, we could argue that the real price of most tech products had fallen over time relative to functionality offered, i.e., there has been negative inflation in this business.

Independently of all that, there is no law against looking at inflation-adjusted valuations. The question is, what does it mean, if anything at all.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MacBook Pro 


The proof is everywhere. For example;
The $50 million Apple donated to help Stanford Medical Center build its new $2 billion hospital.
Apple's leading participation in Project RED, to which they have contributed $50 million to help women and children affected by HIV/AIDS in Africa.
http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/12/02/02/tim_cook_exposes_the_lie_that_steve_jobs_ignored_philanthropy_.html
Apple executives and officers donated more than $3 million worth of company shares to charitable causes during the holiday season of 2010.
http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/10/12/31/apple_execs_officers_donate_over_3_million_the_charity_for_the_holidays.html
Apple matches personal charitable contributions of employees up to $10,000 per year which could amount to several hundred million dollars annually.
http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/11/09/08/charitable_matching_of_up_to_10k_now_available_for_apple_employees.html

Tim Cook highlighting $150 million in charitable contributions over several years does little to undo the public's perception of Apple as a scrooge in the charitable contributions category.

You do realize that many of the other companies that even get close to Apple's profits give several hundreds of millions ANNUALLY to charity, ranging from 5-10% of their profit? Apple can't even claim getting anywhere close to 1% of their profit donated to charity.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Macky the Macky 

Bullcrap!  Apple has never made their charitable giving a public boast. "Giving in secret" is the highest order of giving. Also by instituting corp matching donations, Apple is amplifying the effects of their employee's donations. 

Can you please explain how a publicly traded company with mandatory SEC filings is able to "give in secret"???

Quote:

Originally Posted by melgross 


There's nothing in either of those articles to support what you've said. As we all know, Apple is fanatic about secrecy, and as Cook said at All Things D, he was doubling down on secrecy. So asking a couple of "spokesperson's" about this who rarely know anything anyway, means nothing. What was interesting was the statements that said that something was being done.
No one in the articles actually said that they weren't working with Apple on this. Some of the rest was speculation from the article writers themselves, who know even less.

Ok whatever, we'll see who is right and who is wrong in a year or two.

Quote:

Originally Posted by e_veritas 

 

Tim Cook highlighting $150 million in charitable contributions over several years does little to undo the public's perception of Apple as a scrooge in the charitable contributions category.

 

You do realize that many of the other companies that even get close to Apple's profits give several hundreds of millions ANNUALLY .....

Who cares.

It's not Tim Cook's -- or the Board's -- money to give away. I think it's fabulous that a CEO actually understands that.

Quote:

Originally Posted by anantksundaram 

Who cares.

 

It's not Tim Cook's -- or the Board's -- money to give away. I think it's fabulous that a CEO actually understands that.

The debate over whether or not or a company should be an active and beneficial member of their community is a long one that I have no interest in touching.

My issue is with Tim Cook and others here PRETENDING that Apple is a charitable company when the reality is, they give peanuts compared to others. I'm glad to see that you agree with me that Apple is NOT a charitable company, but you should be bringing this to the attention of others making inaccurate statements, and not killing the messenger for highlighting this fact....

Quote:

Originally Posted by JerrySwitched26 

 

 

Apple's phone business is currently the biggest single source of profits.  In my opinion, the market has a huge growth potential as emerging markets shift to smartphones and Apple continues to market older models (which have a low marginal cost) to these new markets.  Apple has solid products at various price points in the phone game.  Not only are they well positioned to capture sales in new markets, even established markets are experiencing double-digit rates of conversion to smartphones, and in these markets, Apple can  sell huge numbers of its latest and greatest iterations at early-adopter prices.

 

With tablets, things are much less clear.  Apple currently dominates, and so, only a growth in the market itself could result in greatly increased sales for Apple.  Will the tablet market grow as fast as smartphone market?  Will margins remain attractive, like they have in the phone biz?  Time will tell.  

 

 

The PC market is not going to grow nearly as fast as the smartphone or the tablet markets.  It is not a prime source of profits anymore.  Apple can concentrate on niches within the overall market, but overall, there's less potential.

The key is that the tablet market is the new PC market. Steve saw this as far back as 2007 (see All Things D full interview, note contrast with Bill Gates who basically had no idea what he was doing [I admire his philanthropy though I continue to call for Bill to step away completely from Microsoft]).

Smartphones are important because it is the number one electronic device everyone in the world needs.

Tablets will be critical because the tablet is the new PC and PCs can only hold their own or simply start to gradually erode. Websites, alone, are so grossly bloated that native apps and web apps have become so enjoyable with regards to iOS tablets. 

So the writing is on the wall for the PC market, smartphones have had a massive shakeup in just five years, and the next five years will see a big shakeup of the PC market. Anyone that needs a PC will be hard-pressed to look for something thin, light, or simply dirt, dirt cheap. Anyone that is reticent to get a complicated PC will simply get a tablet.

Apple is in an amazing position right now. Wall Street is trying to ride them but not many people realise Apple itself buys and sells a massive amount of securities. Apple's trading of their $100 billion of securities puts them in the top 20 financial traders in the world.

Look at the last few lines. In six months they spent almost $100 billion in securities. Now I'm not sure what the leverage was on that but I can bet it's pretty low.

Apple could walk into any bank (or country for that matter, not in Europe, I guess) and ask for a $1 Trillion loan... And they would get it.

You know the movie Contact with Jodie Foster? If we had alien plans to build a super space-time travelling device, Apple would be the prime company to build it. Of course, you would only be able to go to the planets Apple has pre-approved. LOL.

As usual, I can't seem to edit my post, I meant to say above, "anyone who wants a PC will be hard-pressed not to purchase a PC that is thin, light, or simply a dirt cheap piece of junk."

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tallest Skil 


You don't have an edit button?

If I embed images after one or two images when I click the Edit button the WSIWYG editor is like just a big block of grey. In Safari, no less.