sell! sell! sell!

[tiznow]

All that said .. They have over 200 billion in cash and continue to produce tons of it.. So stock wise not super overvalued or anything.. Might be a buy here heading into iPhone 7... iPhone will be around for a long time .. Being the first ..people are used to the ecosystem and will stick with it for most part long term through the coming generations even as/if competition gets better..

Just boggles my mind that you are sitting on 200 bil+ and doing nothing new other than stock buybacks increased dividends and the watch stuff which at this point seems like Apple fanboys only.. chasing everybody's tail with Apple TV that they sat on forever for whatever reason .. Probably cause they couldn't get any profits/margins on it (short term thinking).. Amazon on other hand willing to take near term hit on profits for long term gains and doesn't care if things like their phone fail miserable cause they also have winners like echo..

 

[tiznow]

Nevermind what I said positively about Apple and their cash stash never really investigated it much and forgot about them stashing a lot of it overseas to tax dodge..

valuation makes a lot more sense now.. Also they don't have the cash on hand to make a big splash/purchase without taking on more debt..

---------------

[h=1]Apple isn’t really sitting on $216 billion in cash[/h]Apple has more than $215 billion reserved, but Chief Executive Tim Cook isn’t stuffing his couch cushions with cash.In its earnings report Tuesday, Apple Inc. again detailed a giant cash pile, with Chief Executive Tim Cook crowing of having “the mother of all balance sheets.”
The more than $215 billion Apple has in reserve is a constant fascination of bloggers and market watchers, who imagine the company going on an acquisition spree or buying back (even more) company stock.
So why is Apple AAPL, +0.14% planning to go further into debt, as Chief Financial Officer Luca Maestri promised in Apple’s conference call Tuesday?
The problem with Apple’s “cash pile” is that most of it is not actually “cash” nor “on hand,” and it doesn’t take into account Apple’s debt. Apple has about $16.7 billion in cash and equivalents on its balance sheet. The majority of the assets included in its reserve is stashed in long-term marketable securities, meaning Apple plans to let those funds — roughly $177.7 billion — accrue interest for more than a year.
More importantly, almost all of Apple’s cash and securities are stashed overseas, proceeds from sales outside the United States that Apple will not bring back because it would then have to pay U.S. taxes. Maestri said Tuesday that $200 billion of Apple’s reserves — a whopping 93% — are overseas, andCook has expressly said Apple does not plan to sacrifice roughly 40% of that stash in order to bring the proceeds home to Cupertino, Calif.
While cash and securities pile up overseas, Apple is piling up debt in the United States. The company currently sits on about $53.2 billion in long-term debt obligations as well as $32.2 billion in “non-current liabilities,” after executing a series of bond sales including the largest in history for a nonfinancial U.S. business.
And those debts don’t include the cash Apple has promised its shareholders, which are mostly financed by its bond sales. After spending more than $8.8 billion on stock repurchases and dividends in the fourth quarter of 2015, Apple is a little more than three-quarters of the way through a $200 billion capital-return program that it believes will set a corporate record for stock buybacks. There is another $47 billion promised to shareholders.
The promise to investors is why Maestri said more debt is likely.
“We also plan to be very active in the U.S. and international debt markets in 2016 in order to fund our capital return activities,” the financial chief said in Tuesday’s conference call.
There is no doubt that Apple is raking in cash with its massive hardware sales, and has plenty of ammunition for potential acquisitions. But when you see blog posts that compare Apple’s “cash pile” to the gross domestic products of small nations or detail what other companies Apple could buy with it, remember that Apple is actually borrowing to finance the promises it has already made.

 

[tiznow]

Zika quietly creeping into us .. By peak mosquito season projected to hit most of east/west coast and to middleish part of country.. Obviously the more south the more prevalent...

-----------

Zika virus cases in Florida grow to U.S.-leading 88

There are four confirmed cases in Palm Beach County and five statewide involving pregnant women, the Florida Department of Health said. The home counties of the pregnant women have not been disclosed.

The CDC this week said it has confirmed 358 Zika cases in the continental U.S., all of them related to travel to areas that have seen outbreaks of the virus, such as South America and the Caribbean. A Boca Raton woman told The Post this week that she likely contracted the virus while in Colombia for a family funeral.

Miami-Dade leads the state’s count. It and Broward County, with 13 cases, have more than half of Florida’s total.

The CDC lists the states with the most cases after Florida as New York, with 55; California, with 29, and Texas, with 27.

-------------

[h=1]NASA maps Zika's potential spread in the U.S.[/h](CNN)Houston, we have a problem. It's a Zika-carrying mosquito.

OK, nobody in space is saying that. But it is true that NASA scientists have created a map to better target future search-and-destroy missions for the deadliest animal on the planet, the female Aedes aegypti mosquito. The blood-sucking females are responsible for the spread of dangerous diseases such as yellow and dengue fevers, chikungunya and now Zika.
The researchers focused their analysis on 50 cities within or near to the currently known range of the Aedes aegypti in the United States. The resulting map, newly released in the journal PLOS Currents, applies factors such as temperature, amount of rainfall, poverty levels and travel to the United States from Zika-affected areas of the world. Even more, the researchers analyzed the risk for each month in the year.
A glance quickly shows that except for the tip of Texas and a bit of Florida, including the Keys, most areas of the United States have little to no risk during the winter months. That's the time when colder temperatures and/or a lack of moisture keep mosquito eggs from hatching. Then, as rains and high temperatures begin to gather strength in the Southeast, the risk begins to rise, spreading across the South to California and up into the middle of the country.
By June, nearly all of those 50 cities "exhibit the potential for at least low-to-moderate abundance," according to the study, "and most eastern cities are suitable for moderate-to-high abundance."

 

[tiznow]

And it's not just a problem for newborns has ramifications for neurological function in adults too..

Mother Nature will continue to try her best to weed us out likely to no avail as we fight her off...

another joy of global warming (regardless the source) these tropical bugs now able to creep further north into the US

-----------

Zika Linked to Ever More Neurological Conditions

[COLOR=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.65098)]

[/COLOR]
As the Zika virus has spread across the Americas these past few months, there has been more and more evidence that its greatest dangers are neurological. It’s been linked to the birth defect microcephaly, and the autoimmune nervous disorder Guillain-Barré pretty much from the beginning of the outbreak, but scientists are starting to see connections to other neurological conditions as well.
The outbreak has led to a rush on research to solidify these links, and in the cases of microcephaly and Guillain-Barré, the connection is finally strong enough to be called causal. In its Zika situation report on Thursday, the World Health Organization used the word “cause” to describe the relationship between Zika and these two conditions.
“Based on a growing body of preliminary research, there is scientific consensus that Zika virus is a cause of microcephaly and Guillain-Barré syndrome,” the report reads.
But this confirmation is hardly the end of Zika’s neurological mysteries. There have been recent case reports of people exposed to the virus who’ve come down with different kinds of infections of the brain and spinal cord. In Guadeloupe, there was a case of acute myelitis (an inflammation of the spinal cord) in a 15-year-old girl; there was a French case study of a man who came down with meningoencephalitis (inflammation of the brain and its outer membranes); and new research out of Recife, Brazil, presented at the American Academy of Neurology annual meeting, has found two people who, after presenting with symptoms consistent with Zika or another flavivirus, came down with acute disseminated encephalomyelitis (ADEM). ADEM is a “brief but widespread attack of inflammation in the brain and spinal cord,” according to the National Institutes of Health.
In the Recife sample, there were six patients who showed neurological symptoms (post-flavivirus symptoms)—the two ADEM cases, and four Guillain-Barré cases. Though both Guillain-Barré and ADEM are typically temporary conditions, in this study, five of the patients had “sustained motor dysfunction” after they were discharged, one had vision problems, and one had cognitive decline. ADEM, myelitis, and Guillain-Barré can all damage myelin, the protective sheath around nerve cells, which could lead to long-term consequences for nerve function.
All of this suggests that the Zika virus may target nerve cells in particular. (A previous study also found that Zika proliferates in neural stem cells, which may be how it causes microcephaly.) That may be why all these neurological conditions are occurring in association with Zika. But it’s not clear whether these kind of complications were always a feature of Zika, or if they’re new, Reuters reports:

Scientists are of two minds about why these new maladies have come into view. The first is that, as the virus is spreading through such large populations, it is revealing aspects of Zika that went unnoticed in earlier outbreaks in remote and sparsely populated areas. The second is that the newly detected disorders are more evidence that the virus has evolved.
​

The latest findings are significant for another reason, too. Much of the focus on the Zika virus has been the extent to which Zika can harm or kill fetuses. Ongoing research shows that while the illness is often mild in older children and adults, it can be serious for them, too.
As always with emerging outbreaks such as this, as some questions are answered, more are raised. But it’s become clear that, as Raad Shakir, president of the World Federation of Neurology, wrote in The Lancet, “Neurological expertise is … crucial to deal with potential Zika sequelae.” Unfortunately, though, he notes that “in many economically deprived areas hit hardest by these disorders, there is a shortage of neurologists.”

 

[eek.]

The next big thing, when they finally figure it out, will be voice controlled computing like they do in star trek.
Typing is so YESTERDAY
Then all you'll need is a headset with a googlie glass type thing and your ipad99 can sit in your pocket

The other big thing is VR which will be huge for gaming and various commercial stuff

 

[tiznow]

Japan disappointed with no further easing.. Global markets all red.. Reaching the limits (short of just handing out "free" checks to everybody) now that we into negative rate land

----------------

Nikkei Shares Tumble After Bank of Japan Leaves Policies Unchanged


ByDominique Fong and
Kosaku Narioka

Updated April 28, 2016 4:10 a.m. ET
Japanese stocks tumbled Thursday after the Bank of Japan surprised many market watchers by holding back from further stimulus.
Japan’s Nikkei Stock Average ended down 3.6%—the largest daily percentage loss since Feb. 12.
Trading elsewhere in Asia was choppy. Korea’s Kospi lost 0.7%, and Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 gained 0.7%. In China, the Shanghai Composite Index closed down 0.3%. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index closed 0.1% higher.
The Bank of Japan left its easing program alone, keeping the deposit rate at minus 0.1% and its asset purchases at 80 trillion yen each year. It also pushed back the forecast date for hitting its 2% inflation target. Expectations had been growing for further easing.
“The stock market was disappointed about the BOJ decision, and now Japanese stock prices are going down,” said Shingo Ide, chief equity strategist for the NLI Research Institute, a think tank in Tokyo. “The stock market will search the bottom level of their price today.”
Japanese financial authorities likely want to examine the effects of the negative interest rate policy, adopted earlier this year, and keep its easing cards for possible future use, said Hideyuki Ishiguro, senior strategist at Daiwa Securities.
Overnight, the Federal Reserve kept U.S. interest rates pat and gave an ambiguous outlook on whether it might act in June. The Fed’s signal that it was in no rush to raise rates relieved investors, who sent U.S. stocks slightly higher Wednesday.
The Bank of Japan’s decision “took the steam out of overheating expectations,” Mr. Ishiguro said. BOJ officials “might have been ready to act if the Federal Open Market Committee outcome overnight had pointed to a June rate increase, New York stocks had fallen sharply and other global markets had destabilized.”
Japanese bank shares took a huge hit, as the Topix banking index sank 6.3%. Shinsei Bank Ltd. and Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc. each fell 6%. Nomura shares plunged 10% following weak earnings results.
Japanese stocks were also falling after data in the morning showed that consumer prices fell 0.3% in March from a year earlier, the first drop in five months.
During Thursday’s session, the yen strengthened more than 2% to recently trade at 108.61 per U.S. dollar. That means the yen is 10% stronger than its level on Jan. 29, when the Bank of Japan startled markets and introduced negative interest rates for the first time.
The yen’s strength in recent months has fueled concerns that Japan’s largest manufacturers will be more likely to miss earnings targets. A weaker currency helps Japanese exporters sell their goods at more competitive prices abroad. Sharp gains in the yen could force Japan’s central bank to ease monetary policy.
“We still think the BOJ will go ahead with further easing at some point, probably at the July meeting,” said Michael Moen, a fixed income Asia investment manager for Aberdeen Asset Management. “Not enough time has really passed for them to assess the impact of the negative interest rate policy on the broader economy at this time.”

 

[tiznow]

SpaceX just landed a coveted $83 million military contract

Elon Musk's SpaceX has been awarded an $82.7 million contract to send a U.S. Air Force satellite into space, shattering Boeing-Lockheed's long-held monopoly over military launches.
The contract to launch the Air Force's next generation GPS satellite in 2018 opens a lucrative new revenue stream for SpaceX, which plans to keep costs low by re-using its first-stage rockets.
A successful launch would also prove that the military has more than one option for sensitive launches.
Awarding the contract to SpaceX "achieves a balance between mission success, meeting operational needs, lowering launch costs, and reintroducing competition for National Security Space missions," said Lt. Gen. Samuel Greaves, Air Force Program Executive Officer for Space.
Related: SpaceX plans Mars mission for 2018
SpaceX had been competing with United Launch Alliance, a joint venture between Boeing (BA) and Lockheed (LMT) that previously had a monopoly on U.S. military launches. But ULA dropped out of the bidding process late last year.
Among the reasons: The venture uses rocket engines that are built in Russia, and deteriorating relations with Russia have led Congress to restrict the use of engines made there for military launches.
Musk, who is also CEO of electric car maker Tesla Motors (TSLA), fought hard for the right to bid for the contract. SpaceX filed a federal lawsuit challenging rules that blocked it from earlier bids. The suit was settled out of court, and SpaceX was granted permission to bid for future launches.
Related: Musk reveals the cause of SpaceX explosion
SpaceX does have some other government contracts, including one to ferry supplies to the International Space Station, and another to eventually carry U.S. astronauts into space as well. Despite congressional limits on the use of Russian rocket engines,NASA now depends on the Russian space agency to carry astronauts back and forth to the ISS.
Musk said Thursday that SpaceX's first mission to Mars could be less than two years away. The company plans to send a modified version of its Dragon spacecraft, called Red Dragon, to survey the terrain on Mars and potentially collect soil samples.

 

[tiznow]

US yoy gdp 0.5% vs 0.7% estimate 3rd conseqcutive quarter of declines trending towards zero/negative land...

 

[tiznow]

Finally time for the madness to end? Usually a solid sign when you get significant late day market moves like this on no news persay

quite the topping process of this finally it.. With market top reached roughly a year ago.. With lots of kicking and screaming dives and rallies along the way...

 

[tiznow]

We doing a great job of exporting obesity..

-------

[h=1]Obesity rates skyrocket in China’s rural kids[/h]China’s little emperors are not so little anymore. A new study shows that childhood obesity rates in some parts of rural China have skyrocketed, leading to what authors say is a “serious” public health problem. In rural Shandong province, the percentage of overweight and obese boys jumped 60-fold, from just 0.5% in 1985 to 30.7% in 2014; in girls, those rates rose from 0.8% to 20.6% over the same period, the authors report online today in the European Journal of Preventive Cardiology. Why the sudden increase? Researchers say a nationwide shift to high-energy Western diets—including fast foods and soda—combined with more time behind computer and television monitors underlie the trend. But that’s only part of the story: As average household incomes have risen dramatically across China, many previously poor families are overfeeding their only children (this is especially true when grandparents are in charge). Compared with the country as a whole, the new numbers are high—an international survey by The Lancet in 2014 found that just 23% of boys and 14% of girls in all of China were obese or overweight. That discrepancy could stem from smaller sample sizes or other unexplored factors, says epidemiologist and health economist Eric Feigl-Ding of Harvard University, who was not involved in the study. But the bottom line remains the same: China’s littlest citizens are growing up—and out—quickly.

 

[tiznow]

Another corrupt socialist experiment gone bad..

--------

[h=1]Venezuela nearing total “collapse”[/h]A recent International Monetary Fund report that Venezuela will reach a 720 percent inflation rate this year — the highest in the world — has drawn a lot of media attention, but what I heard from a senior IMF economist this week was even more dramatic.
Robert K. Rennhack, deputy director of the IMF’s Western Hemisphere department, told me in an interview that Venezuela is on a path to hyperinflation — the stage where the economy reaches total chaos — and could reach a “total collapse of the economic system” in 12 to 18 months if there are no changes in economic policies.
“Inflation in Venezuela probably entered on a hyperinflationary path in 2015,” Rennhack says. He told me that he expects Venezuela’s inflation to reach 2.200 percent in 2017, and could balloon very fast to 13,000 a year, the stage that most academics define as full-blown hyper-inflation.
Although he didn’t get into that, no Latin American government in recent memory has been able to survive a hyper-inflationary crisis. When you reach five-digit inflation rates, governments either make a dramatic political u-turn, or they fall.
“Hyper-inflation means that the currency has lost its value, people have to go to the stores with bags full of money, and prices rise almost by the hour,” Rennhack said. “What we saw in previous cases of hyperinflation in Latin America is that there was a political consensus that policies had to change.”
Asked how he reached his 12-18 month projection for hyper-inflation in Venezuela, Rennhack said his team of economists looked at previous episodes of hyper-inflation in Bolivia (1982-1984,) Argentina (1989-1990) and Brazil (1989-1990.) From those experiences, they concluded that Venezuela is on a similar path as these countries were between 12 and 18 months before their hyper-inflationary crises.
President Nicolas Maduro’s term ends in 2019, although the opposition MUD coalition is considering launching a referendum to demand early elections.
Many Venezuelans believe the country will explode much sooner than in 12 to 18 months. Prices go up daily, supermarket shelves are near empty, there are growing electricity shortages — Maduro has declared every Friday in April and May a non-working holiday in order to save energy — and crime statistics are skyrocketing.
The Venezuelan currency, the Bolivar, is increasingly worthless. Not even robbers want it: a few months ago, news report quoted an engineer named Pedro Venero as saying that he was attacked by armed robbers who were looking for U.S. dollars stashed in his home, but refused to take Bolivars.
Since Maduro took office after a dubious election in 2013, the economy has collapsed from a 5 percent growth rate that year to an 8 percent contraction in 2016. Most importantly, poverty has ballooned from 23 percent to 73 percent of Venezuelan households over the same period, according to a joint study by the University Andres Bello, the Central University of Venezuela and the Simon Bolivar University.
My opinion: With Venezuela on a “hyper-inflationary path,” it’s hard to see how Maduro can finish his term in 2019.
Most likely, there will be a military coup — current speculation is that it would come from “Chavista” army officers concerned about Maduro’s incompetence — or a regional diplomatic offensive to press Maduro to respect the laws passed by the opposition-controlled National Assembly.
Granted, many Venezuelans are skeptical that Venezuela’s opposition will get enough votes at the 34-country Organization of American States (OAS) to apply the organization’s Democratic Charter, which would demand that Maduro take specific steps to restore democratic rule. But skeptics about the outcome of a OAS vote could be wrong: Venezuela’s petro-diplomacy has lost its clout in the region with the collapse of oil prices, and Latin America’s political map is changing fast, moving away from Venezuela’s corruption-ridden socialist model.
A collective regional move under the OAS Democratic Charter to demand a constitutional solution to the Venezuelan crisis would be much better than a military coup, which — no matter which side it comes from — would mark a return to the dark ages of Latin America’s military regimes. The region’s democracies should seek an OAS Democratic Charter vote as early as next month, because the alternative — doing nothing — may lead to a “total collapse of the economic system” followed by a military government.

 

[tiznow]

Gold taking off again.. Surprised oil do so well chop still plowing forward as market weakens...

 

[tiznow]

Spoke too soon oil starting to follow market now gold keeps plowing forward... Starting to sense the insanity finally over and reality will now begin...

 

[eek.]

What is the most expensive object on Earth?

True or false? A new nuclear power station in the south-west of the UK will be the most expensive object on Earth. That's the claim about the proposed plant at Hinkley Point in Somerset - but has anything else ever cost so much to build?

"Hinkley is set to be the most expensive object on Earth… best guesses say Hinkley could pass £24bn ($35bn)," said the environmental charity Greenpeace last month as it launched a petition against the project.

This figure includes an estimate for paying interest on borrowed money, but the financing arrangements for Hinkley C are so opaque that it is impossible to calculate exactly what the final cost will be.

Even if you stick with the expense of construction alone, though, the price is still high - the main contractor, EDF, puts it at £18bn ($26bn).

For that sum you could build a small forest of Burj Khalifas - the world's tallest building, in Dubai, cost a piffling £1bn ($1.5bn). You could also knock up more than 70 miles of particle accelerator. The 17-mile-long Large Hadron Collider, built under the border between France and Switzerland to unlock the secrets of the universe, cost a mere £4bn ($5.8bn).

The most expensive bridge ever constructed is the eastern replacement span of the Oakland Bay Bridge in San Francisco, designed to withstand the strongest earthquake seismologists would expect within the next 1,500 years. That cost about £4.5bn ($6.5bn).

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-36160368

 

[eek.]

Venezuela nearing total “collapse”

No mention of the words oil price or the word drought in that entire article either. Amazing

Venezuela introduces two-day week to deal with energy crisis

Venezuela's government has imposed a two-day working week for public sector workers as a temporary measure to help it overcome a serious energy crisis.

Vice-President Aristobulo Isturiz announced that civil servants should turn up for work only on Mondays and Tuesdays until the crisis was over.

Venezuela is facing a major drought, which has dramatically reduced water levels at its main hydroelectric dam.

Electricity Minister Luis Motta looks at the massive Guri Dam, virtually dry because of the drought

Many businessmen and opposition politicians blame the energy crisis and shortages of basic goods on government economic mismanagement.

They say tough currency controls introduced in 2003 by the late president, Hugo Chavez, have only made this worse.

But Venezuela's economy has also been hit by a sharp fall in the price of its main export, oil.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-36145184

 

[eek.]

The Guri dam is actually the 4th largest hydropower plant in the world

 

[tiznow]

Venezuela nearing total “collapse”

No mention of the words oil price or the word drought in that entire article either. Amazing

Venezuela introduces two-day week to deal with energy crisis

Venezuela's government has imposed a two-day working week for public sector workers as a temporary measure to help it overcome a serious energy crisis.

Vice-President Aristobulo Isturiz announced that civil servants should turn up for work only on Mondays and Tuesdays until the crisis was over.

Venezuela is facing a major drought, which has dramatically reduced water levels at its main hydroelectric dam.

Electricity Minister Luis Motta looks at the massive Guri Dam, virtually dry because of the drought

Many businessmen and opposition politicians blame the energy crisis and shortages of basic goods on government economic mismanagement.

They say tough currency controls introduced in 2003 by the late president, Hugo Chavez, have only made this worse.

But Venezuela's economy has also been hit by a sharp fall in the price of its main export, oil.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-36145184

obviously oil was the main catalyst.. To finally push them over the cliff into runaway hyperinflation which is the end game for all fiat currencies I might add ...

at the same time when your entire economy is dependent on the price of one commodity it's only a matter of when.. See Saudi Arabia waking up and beginning the diversification process...

 

[Recon792]

markets look like they are teetering on the edge now

 

[tiznow]

It's has been for a while now hussman in his weekly explains how that's usually the case and market tops take a while to form.. They managed to claw back some at end of day today..

--------

It’s largely forgotten that during the 2000 top formation, the S&P 500 lost 12% from July-October 1999, recovered to fresh highs, retreated by nearly 10% from December 1999 to February 2000, recovered to fresh highs, experienced another 10% correction into May, recovered to a new high in total return (though not in price) on September 1, 2000, retreated 17% by December, and by January 2001 had recovered within 10% from its all-time high, and was unchanged from its level of June 1999.
Likewise, during the 2007 top formation, the S&P 500 corrected nearly 10% from July to August, recovered to a fresh high in October, corrected over 10% into November, recovered nearly all of it by December, followed with a 16% loss, and by May 2008 had recovered within 9% of its all-time high, and was unchanged from its level of October 2006.

http://hussman.net/wmc/wmc160425.htm

 

[snoop]

Halliburton is backing out Baker Hughes deal, agreed to pay $3.5b termination fee.