humbug1873

slurpy said:

40 BILLION? That's fucking insane. How much money does Apple Pay even make Apple? I think it's almost negligent. It's more of a value added feature for their ecosystem. 

Pure insanity. Meanwhile companies that engage in actual egregious shit get no punishments, or pathetic slaps on the wrist. 

Those fines are supposed to REALLY hurt. So it makes sense they are based on a percentage of the worldwide revenue. Otherwise companies might just continue doing illegal business practices accepting 'low' fines as the cost of doing business. Since the EU cares about adherence to law more than about money, that makes sense.

bloggerblog said:

A Vision Pro could be your personal computer, just like bringing in a laptop or an iPad. Is this only for residents of Germany, are tourists exempt?

True and if push comes to shove you need to proof, that you bought your laptop in the EU. That can well be done after they 'caught' you (i.e. you went to the green lane and they randomly picked you for a control). Same goes for any valuables (Jewelery, Expensive Cameras, etc). In that case you have to provide proof in within a few weeks.

Since the Vision Pro is not available outside the US, it's essentially a clear case. You'll have to pay the taxes (19% in Germany if you declare it ... if you didn't it's twice that for punishment).

On the plus side: The honest importer will most likely financially not be worse off, than waiting to buy the product in the EU for final EU pricing (likely to be around 4800EUR). Even if he payed sales taxes in the US. Because the Apple EU prices are usually even way higher than US Price + EU Sales tax. Just did a little check on an iPad Pro you end up paying US Price + 19% Germany Sales Tax (EU sales taxes can be as high as 24%) + 17% on top because Apple can.

Stabitha_Christie said:

Does this mean we are now great again?

They haven't  told you!? 'MAGA - Make America Go Away'  ... back to the so called good old day, where the US was an agrarian society with a few mega rich.

I pulled my investments, money  and accounts  out the US in preparation for the current idiot ... in December .. and plan to keep my money out of the US and away from US companies for the foreseeable future.

I don't like to deal with idiots, that elected that clown not once but twice instead of putting him into a jail cell. From a country that did this mistake once before almost 100 years ago. Don't give in to fascists.

It's time we get liberated form US dominance. So liberation day was right.

Is this also one of these design prices where you actually pay the awards organisation money and then they invent a new, fitting category in which this device wins said award?  (At least that is the way the infamous 'red dot design award' usually works).

What a complete and utter nonsense. Stocks go up, stocks go down and that's not always related to a companies performance.

AAPL almost always has a year end rally where stock price reaches new record only to lose significantly in Q2 (first quarter of the calendar year). December is a good month to sell AAPL. Stock price usually recovers by the end of the year.

This year obviously the major damage is that convicted felon in the White House and his crazy tariffs .... and obviously Tim has lost his ability to handle the orange clown.

Thankfully I did the obvious thing and emptied my US stock deposit (which I had from my days working for Apple) and sold stocks I got for around $1 a piece ... not exactly at the top but at $250. Because I no longer trust any US bank to handle money, you never know what crazy shit the convicted felon is doing next.

Let me guess ... they release AAA-Games months after the console/PC release and are wondering why people are not/no longer interested in buying the game for the iPhone!? Of course that makes no sense/even less if they charge a high list price for old games.
Also, based on my own experience ports usually are horrible, so I wouldn't touch them with a long pole.
Where are the AAA-Games that are Apple First?

I would also guess, that the whole Apple Game fetish will eventually die/disappear like the other 3(?) times they promised to push for games, that never shown any lifesigns.

If I have to go outside of the Apple Ecosystem to make in-app payments I re-think my intention to spend money on that. Why!?

1. Because it usually is a pain in the a... 'behind' to cancel a subscription outside of the Apple ecosystem. So I rather avoid that to begin with.
2. So I have to give my private and payment detail to some dubious third party group and probably open yet another account, that then gets hacked within a few short days, because these guys are cheap and stupid.  No thank you.

So in the end. Enforcing 'outside' payments is a quick way to lose/never win me as a paying customer for your stuff.

rob53 said:

Look at what's happening with its automobile market, it's tanking. Will Germany sue other car companies because they no longer can keep up with technology and the desires of consumers? 

Pretty simple. Competitive Chinese cars have a tariff (courtesy of the EU up to 30%), US cars don't (e.g. BMW X5/X7 sold in Germany are actually imported from the US as they are not produced in the EU) ...  US Cars from US companyes (except for Tesla which is nowadays made in Germany but still tanking) are exceedingly rare in Germany (Although I think Chrysler builds it's cars in Austria), or have a very bad image (high MPG, WAY too big, or specialities like the Corvette, which is considered a car for pimps)
Companies like Ford actually produce in Germany (cars designed for the EU market)

Kwikiwi said:

I am not a big fan of stock buy backs for Apple. The main issue I have is that Apple has to take out debt to buy the stock back and it has gone from being debt free to having over $100 Billion of long term debt that now costs over 4% to service. Yes they generate lots of cash and are able to service the debt but things can change rapidly in the tech industry and that could be a problem in the future. If they did a better dividend scheme, say 50% of all net profit paid out as a dividend the return would be very healthy and by it's nature always serviceable and they could reduce their long term debt substantially. I know dividends create issues when so much of the profit (greater than 54%) is generated overseas and that a lot of people will go on about lazy balance sheets, and I understand their thinking, but I would rather they had bigger cash reserves, less debt and did some better acquisitions than so much in buy backs. Having said all of that I am very fortunate to have done well from my shareholding in Apple over a 20 year period and extremely grateful for that - I just don't like the massive buy backs.

Yep same here. Stock buybacks and dividends are good for the current shareholders short and medium term, but since it's largely debt financed it removes flexibility in the future. Though its not all bad, since  they still get rates get way below the 4% APR and also (at least used to) get way below inflation APRs (if i remember correctly it was usually way below 1% in the last 10 years).
It's the separation between 'making good products success will come' and 'make shareholders happy and get out in time before things get bad'.
So right now they have a good run, money is coming in, no crisis in sight. That would be the time to save up, pay up and make sure you've got resources should things turn bad. If Apple had worked in the 1980ties the way they do now, they would have gone bankcrupt in the 90'ies.
Still remember Steve Jobs from an Apple internal Comm-meeting in 2001, where he came up with exactly that point. Yes live is bad (2001-3 have been harsh times after the .com bust and 9/11), but Apple works its own buildings and is debt-free, so we still have room to play. Essentially betting the company thrice (iMac, iPod, iPhone), was what enabled Apple to come back from the crypt. If they were in debt working from a leased headquarter at that time, Apple would have been a blip in history.
But hey stripping a company of its resources has and puffers has been the way to ruin companies since the 80's, so sm