Quote:
Originally Posted by jungmark
Jobs wouldn't have done anything either. He would have said "F*** off, short timers. We had the most profitable year in human history and one of the most profitable quarters in human history. If you don't like it, sell."
That's a good distinction to make. "short timers" points to a certain vocal group of the investment community. Obviously Tim Cook and many Apple employees hold stock so they 'lose money' when the valuation goes down. It's not like they are entirely disconnected from it so there is an incentive for the value to stay high but they are doing better than they ever have.
When people object to them saying they aren't profit driven, it's funny because they've said this for years and nobody seemed to be complaining back when they weren't doing well. Now that they're making $13b profit, it's somehow potentially illegal to say they aren't a profit-driven company. The mentality that surrounds people buying a tiny fraction of a company stock with the hopes of profiting from its increase in value without any effort on their part with suggestions that somehow Apple has to bow to their interests is comical.
If people are truly invested in the company then they should look at the big picture. If they don't feel the company can climb higher and they're in it just to profit, they can invest in a company that still needs to reach Apple's success. What people can't do is complain at Apple for managing to reach the top before they could sell nor should they complain to Apple about how other people value their company because they have no control over that.
No suggestions that get thrown at Apple as to what they should do will improve the situation. Making cheaper/lower quality devices just lowers their margins and damages their brand as a premium product manufacturer. Sony did this and look at them now. While Apple's demand is higher than their supply capacity, they should stay the course.