Xed

ddawson100 said:

Aaaand the stock tanks on reporting. This is about the tariff overhang. Apple is really exposed in this new regime - hardware is 100% a headache and a slide in services guidance doesn’t help.

 It would be quite counterproductive for the whims of this administration to prove to be Apple’s undoing. They have to see that not even Foxconn themselves, even given many (unlimited!) incentives, could set up a factory and “bring manufacturing back” to the US quickly.

 It’s really nerve wracking as a shareholder watching them have to respond to such challenge coming from inside the house, so to speak. I’m hopeful because Apple has a history of facing existential crises.

melgross said:

I’m still ticked at Apple’s indifference to direct shareholder benefits. Seriously, a 4% increase in dividend payments when they declare another massive $100 billion in buybacks? It should have been at least a 10% increase and they could have taken a few billion off the buybacks and nobody would have noticed. I’d also rather see them begin to pay off the $132 billion in debt instead of constantly increasing it in order to pay for buybacks. This is not good, folks.

maltz said:

The Airport routers were good, and I had one for a while.  They were VERY reliable... and that's about the only good thing I can say about them.  (Not to minimize that...)  They were some of the most expensive routers on the market while at the same time being among the least-featured.  That has its place, especially at the time, but honestly, if that's all you need, you can probably get by just fine with your ISP-provided router for free these days.  They're not the hot garbage they used to be, and you never have to think about firmware updates, etc.

KMWAZ said:

Just sold 10 of them. Switched to Unifi.  Just as expensive as Apple stuff, and they have a great array of products to complement, and just as easy to set up.  Plus side is the speed is much better, as is security, especially with today's Internet speeds which Apple can't match. 

AppleZulu said:

9secondkox2 said:

Wesley_Hilliard said:

9secondkox2 said:

Wesley_Hilliard said:

The economy is crashing. Ports are empty. Truck drivers have nothing to transport. Shelves will soon be empty of key goods. The dollar is dropping. Jobs are being lost. People aren't buying anything. There's no flow into the treasury. Our national debt is going up as a result of these tariffs as Americans do without. The global trade continues with the US removed unabated. We're the only ones harmed by this action. No one is negotiating anything.

So yeah, great plan all around so far.

Meanwhile China is removing some tarriffs snd msking exemptions. 

Like I said before, it’s too early. Less knee jerk reactions and more balanced analysis before we see the ultimate results. 

Nobody like a fight. But sometimes they’re necessary. And when you fight, you don’t do so just to fight. It’s to win. So far, we are seeing other countries wilting. 

We'll see what happens.

That’s all I’m saying. Just wait and see. As much as one side wants to believe trump is an evil bogeyman who can only do wrong, and the other side sees only positive qualities, reality will be what it will be. 

China is already slowing export shipments and thst means less sales and less money going to China. They’ll feel it. That’s more money staying in America. Will it result in actual essentials not being available? It’s an interesting question since we don’t get everything from China. But posdible. It’s also posdible China silently shapes up (though not quite admitting so publicly) and everyone benefits. The other option is other countries and even American itself picks up the slack and a new global economy emerges. There are a number of ways it can go. 

But ultimately time will tell. 

As I’ve said before, when someone is setting your house on fire, “wait and see” is not a viable response. 

I am not reflexively objecting to the tariffs because I don’t like Donald Trump. I am objecting because it is so clearly a bad idea that will do serious damage to our economy. I am objecting because it’s clear there is no plan. I am objecting because it’s clear that the president and his administration don’t understand even the basics of what they’re tinkering with, and they are lying to the public about it as they tinker. 

They have conflated others’ tariffs with our trade deficits. They have conflated trade deficits with the federal deficit. They announced worldwide tariffs on a list of countries, some of which are not countries, some of which are uninhabited, some of which don’t have tariffs on us, some of which we don’t have a trade deficit with, etc. They announced large tariffs on Canada and Mexico first, two of our largest and closest trading partners. The worldwide tariffs are applied indiscriminately on friends and foes alike, undermining longstanding alliances. They have cited China as the primary target of the trade war, while destroying any leverage we might have had against China, by launching tariffs against all of our allies. They had no understanding of how tariffs would impact American companies like Apple or auto manufacturers, so they announced carve-outs and exemptions, but then insisted they hadn’t, or that they’re only temporary. They had no understanding of how launching a trade war in the spring will probably cause the greatest possible damage to the agricultural sector. They have no understanding that tariffs won’t just increase prices for US consumers, but will result in cancelled orders, shortages and empty shelves, from now, all the way through the economically critical holiday season. They are unaware that the US lacks the capacity or lead time to ramp up and replace production of halted imports. They argue that increased tariffs will protect US manufacturing, but insist that they are doing deals that will eliminate the tariffs. The president announced that they have more deals in progress than there are countries. The president announced he is talking with Xi Jinping, yet China says there have been no calls or conversations. 

The list goes on. The incompetence and malfeasance is real and it is obvious. 

So no, I am not inclined to “wait and see” if this is all just three-dimensional chess and master statecraft. It is glaringly obvious that it is not. 

Just to add to the list, as I was writing this, bulletins popped up that the economy contracted last quarter, amid fears of recession. 

So no, we don’t have time to wait and see.