Topic: On Apple's $200 billion dump and US shooting itself in the foot (Read 607 times)

The interesting thing I learned about this "mess" is that apparently Chinese government never wanted to go down this path. They had drank the Kool-aid so to speak and were happy in the unipolar world order having to rely on importing technologies. The idiots in Washington on the other hand, specifically starting from Trump admin., thought bans work and like always they were wrong.
Now China is running its own massive chip industries that is growing much faster than its competitors and they are also entering the "high tech chips" territories and setting new records.

It's worth repeating what I said 6-7 months ago:

From this fact, many can certainly conclude that the US has always been ahead in terms of technology in the past, but with today's advances, China is starting to show rapid progress and this can be proven by their good technological innovation, of course they have not moved on from history, why should the US be worried? regarding this problem with super cheap global competition making companies unable to compete with the emphasis on sanctions "to China and vice versa to the US making the many losses suffered by China's nightmare even worse for Apple and the US technology market and the bad situation that will happen in the future.

Hopefully a little more balanced.



Let's put some details into perspective.


More balanced info is when you compare both articles:https://www.forbes.com/sites/katharinabuchholz/2023/08/31/us-dollar-defends-role-as-global-currency-infographic/?sh=395ec9585999

with
https://www.businessinsider.com/apple-200-billion-drop-sign-post-us-tech-future-near-2023-9

China benefited greatly with the technological transfer, or the sale of the century, many managers just sold out their country's tech.
Governments cannot be trusted.  

I briefly talked about the Chinese car industry last year here and now the statistics say that China overtook Japan as the number one car exporter. This is with a whopping 62% increase in exports in 2023.
https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/china-likely-dethroned-japan-worlds-top-auto-exporter-2023-china-group-2024-01-09/

I'll try to write some thoughts on the dangers of China's expansion. I'm investigating and researching some stuff for now.

I don't have specific numbers, but I have "intermediate" : According to insiders, 253% more iPhone 15s were sold in China in the first two hours after launch than iPhone 14s were sold in the same time in 2022. Further you can do the math.

Tu the question is different really. Some people just took the news in the topic title as "that's it, Apple has collapsed, no one in China will buy an iPhone, Apple shot itself in the foot". Nothing like that Yes, there is a confrontation at the state level, maybe the Chinese leadership thinks that iPhones can "spy" on civil servants, that's why they banned the use of "ON WORK" ! But not to own or use while on vacation. Yes, company stocks are affected by many news items, and this kind of news among others. But... Chinese consumers remained loyal to the brand, and massively buy their phones. And will continue to do so. Because Apple has created an illusion - "if you own an iPhone, you are above others, you are successful and rich"

PS Yes, let me clarify - not a fan of the iPhone, I think it's really overrated. Yes I had iPhones, no - didn't like them

This is the whole point I've been making in this thread. Also keep in mind that the US dependence on others is not just their markets as export destinations, but also US depends on their resources to manufacture stuff they want to export.
For example we saw the significance of this in the sanction war between US and China where US started restricting export of chips to China and China started restricting export of materials used in manufacturing Chips to all those countries!

The US hasn't lost power but it's losing it day by day. Other countries are getting bolder they're making alliances else where. They're getting stronger trading away but US gets weaker. If there's going to be trade wars it's going to hurt America because of retaliatory measures. It's going to get worse for Apple if there isn't a truce.

The important thing is that they do not give specific figures about the number of iPhones sold. If Apple only provides 1,000 or 2,000 iPhones to the Chinese market in the first sale, selling them all is not enough to prove that people are still interested in Apple products.

In my country, the largest phone store chain announced that it had received 10k orders in the first sale. But meanwhile, some smaller store chains announced that they sold 18,000 iPhones in the first round of sales. Later, everyone realized that the news was a ridiculous exaggeration and a lie. Moreover, many retailers always affirm that it is difficult to buy a new iPhone in the first days of sale due to lack of goods and too many customers ordering. But I tried visiting some major stores in my area and discovered there was no shortage of iPhones for sale as many newspapers or dealers were spreading. In addition, the economic situation this year is difficult, the purchasing power of new iPhones in my country is not high, my friends buy Apple's latest iPhone models every year, they also have no intention of buying new iPhones this year. You need to determine the accuracy of articles before believing them to be true.

This is the news I just read today, the China nightmare is getting worse for Apple, and US technology. China is increasingly serious about gradually eliminating dependence on American and Western technology. I believe that things will get much worse in the future when this American technology company's revenue depends too much on the Chinese market.

https://www.businessinsider.com/china-could-ban-foreign-apps-apple-app-store-report-2023-9#:~:text=Apple's%20list%20of%20challenges%20in,revenue%20for%20Apple%20last%20year.

Just because some news has the word "Apple" or "iPhone" in it, doesn't mean it is on topic! Did you even bother reading the opening post or the ongoing discussion in this topic?
We aren't discussing iPhone 15 sale stats or speculating about Apple revenues here! At least read the article from BusinessInsider that I shared before spamming with irrelevant stuff...

I agree with what you said, my comparison may not be entirely correct but I just want to say that many fans of the US still stubbornly refuse to accept the weakening of the US government and the rise of other countries, especially BRICS. Things gradually become clearer, but they still stubbornly believe that it doesn't work and won't change anything. As for the US Government, I believe they are aware of the challenges they are facing. They will use every trick to maintain their dominance, but I believe that history will repeat itself. They have overthrown other regimes to dominate the world, there will also be others who do the same thing as them, nothing lasts forever.

Nokia phones were used by every body. If we didn't have one we knew ppl who used it. When competitors put their smart phones in shops Nokia lost it's market. It couldn't take on battles with expensive Apple or cheap Android phones. They pushed Nokia down. Now I don't know any ppl using Nokia phones. Nokia didn't dominate phone markets for long.

We don't know when it's going to happen but US isn't in a position to stop moves countries are making to push US influence away.

Let's see how this new iphone 15 will do for them. I still think that they are a bit overestimated and shouldn't be this big. They make new laptops with new chips, it was m1, now m2, I am sure it will soon be m3, and so forth along with making new phones that were iphone 13 and then iphone 14 and now iphone 15, I bet next one will be iphone 16.

However, they have used this method for nearly 20 years and grew this big, I do not see why it would no longer be profitable, I bet that they are going to do fine. I just don't know if people will smarten up and maybe look for some other products, not looking like they would, but could still happen if they give it enough time. This is why it's quite important to make sure they will do fine.

The risks to Apple of imposing restrictions in China on government employees have been more than offset by the huge demand among Chinese people. Bottom line: Apple continues to make a super profit, while Chinese civil servants are simply left without an iPhone 15. That's the reality

So much for Chinese patriotism. All iPhones 15 were sold out in a minute on Tmall, the queue is lined up until November
Only a couple of models are promised to be delivered at the end of October
New iPhone 15 were sold out on Chinese platform Tmall within a minute after the start of pre-orders, as reported by Bloomberg.

At this point, the queue for some iPhone 15 models has stretched for a month and a half or more. Only a couple of sets are promised to be delivered at the end of October, the rest of the smartphones will have to wait until November.

Before the presentation of the iPhone 15 Chinese media and social networks of the country discussed a new smartphone Huawei Mate 60 Pro, which was called the next "killer" iPhone. In addition, just before the announcement there were reports that Beijing expanded the ban on the use of Apple products by officials. However, these steps had little effect on the enthusiasm of users.

https://www.ixbt.com/news/2023/09/19/iphone-15-tmall.html

PS Self-moderation is good, but why delete ordinary news on the topic ?

Good examples but there is a fundamental difference here. In case of all these companies we are seeing pure competition and they all continue existing side by side offering their products in a tight competing market. For example in a phone shop you see Apple, Samsung, Nokia, ... all there and you choose between them. That competition is a good thing since it forces all of these companies to keep improving and keep their product prices low.

In case of US, it was not the competition that got US to the "number 1" position in different fields. Instead it was destruction of others, some of which caused directly by US. For example the biggest help to US was World War 2 which only had one winner and it was US because US mainland was completely intact while everywhere else from Europe and Russia to Africa and Asia were destroyed. This is also what shaped the US general policy over the past 80+ years, a "grease the pol behind you" kind of policy.
This also clarifies why US sees any country that improves as a "national security threat"! Because if for example Africa regains its independence and strength, West Asia gets rid of US backed terrorists, etc. that means they will all kick the colonizers out which means all the resources US has been stealing all these years to build that "empire" will no longer be accessible to the regime for free.

It's funny that until now, everything is as clear as day, but there are still many people who do not believe that America's power is gradually weakening and that de-dollarization is just a rumor  .

Yes, the United States is still the world's number 1 power in many fields from economics to military, but look at how other countries are developing. It can be said that other countries are developing strongly while the US seems to be slowing down to let other countries catch up.

What is happening is similar to the Nokia empire, when Apple and Samsung were rising, they thought they were still kings until they were dethroned and withered away. Nothing is forever, the US has dominated the world for more than 100 years and it is time for them to cede it to others. Although America will not be dethroned any time soon, other countries are already taking action.

Your points are very obvious, we can't ignore the fact that the US is gradually losing that position as the most powerful country in the world. But that does not mean it will happen tomorrow or sooner which I can see is the argument of most members here.
The fact that China is taking such measures against Apple and iPhone means there is a slight shift in the way things used to operate. And the question should be why is it happening now and not 15 years back?
Like it or not, the narrative is changing and it is no longer business as usual, boys are becoming men and so it will continue.

You are talking short term, I'm talking long term.
The ban on semiconductor exports to China will damage China in short term and they will obviously suffer (as they've already been damaged). On the other hand, in the long term the China that could freely import semiconductors is different from China that can no longer import them. This new China was forced to manufacture them domestically and so far they have had great success in acquiring the technology and producing high end semiconductors.

That means in long term they have the potential of easily overtaking the global market for semiconductors and their products.

You have to understand that what we call "high tech" is not some alien technology that was acquired by a group of people in a one time only visit from the outer space aliens
If you dedicate funds and brainpower in any sector you can reach the same technology anywhere. It's not like China is a poor country with no money, we all know China has more than enough money to invest in these sectors and reach the same tech level.

It's speeding up because US isn't influencing other countries like it used to. Smaller economies are getting bigger so America can't dominate them if they're happy to trade with Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa and the other in the BRICS block. If they're really upset they'll buy weapons from other countries so US isn't automatic first choice for buyers now.

In 5 years entire international trade numbers for US dollar's going to drop below 50%. America can't do anything about it.

Chips, it's part of the "game". China can produce, hard but can, chips from previous technological generations. It will have enough.
But, uh. There are a lot of areas that are not being talked about openly. Like medicine. European and American companies are the leaders there. And China can't survive by simply "copying" them. This is education. Most of today's specialists in China are former Chinese students in American universities. And at the moment, it has become almost unaffordable for Chinese people. Yes, the U.S. has imposed restrictions on Chinese students in technology departments....
The problem is that China, riding on the money, technology, investment of the West, has decided that it is "cooler" than them. But China is very wrong. Even China's economy depends on buyers in the DEVELOPED world. Reorientation to poor neighbors and developing regions will not help, China's economy is huge and it needs to sell a lot and earn a lot.... And with poor partners it is not realizable !
PS What does Russia have to do with it, I don't understand at all ? At the moment and in the near future - Russia is a resource, degrading, backward country, a terrorist, and a rogue country, nothing more

How would you explain this article then? The ban on high end semiconductor and the following fabrication equipment for those semiconductor is going to damage China so even if there will be a rise in competition against American products, you have to understand that they're probably going to be competing against low class tech since there's still the ban on imports of high-end semiconductors which is pretty crucial if you want to make locally produced, cheaper and high-end tech then those high-end semiconductors are going to be a crucial part for that and all the countries that's producing this semiconductors are already in agreement with the US to not do any importations to China. That $200 billion loss that Apple has experienced, they will eventually gain it back even if China restricts Apple products because Apple is just so popular in the Chinese market, it will be difficult for the CCP to crackdown on the purchase of the Apple products.

As much as we want to hate on the USA and that we think that China and Russia is probably going to replace them, we have to first see what's also happening on the other countries that we think will replace USA in global market and influence. And if you were to check them out, that's when you can decide whether they're really going to be the contender that's going to dethrone USA.

Dedollarisation was spoken about in the 80's, people had various ideas for alternatives.  Yet it survived then, rates went to 15% at one point and have declined alot since then generally though the recent rise appears big is nothing compared to what they had to do previously to turn around Dollar.
  People point out now the national debt is far too much to carry the burden of higher rates and its unlikely the debt can be repaid any time soon to reduce the cost of that debt load hence a possible melt down in Dollar value.  We dont know that happens but alot of factors point to that outcome occurring.


Alot of western economies became too dependent on production elsewhere,  too much service industry not able to innovate is a possible problem many  are concerned on that.   We import that production and capability from elsewhere, its obviously a vulnerability.

I'm not saying that "US will lose power soon", I say US has been losing power for years and it is now only speeding up.

Take dedollarisation for example. Something that people denied is happening 1-2 years ago and we only keep hearing about in the mainstream media recently has been happening for at least 15 years. It's easily seen on statistics too. 15-20 years ago US dollar was used in 75-85% of the entire international trades. Today that is barely reaching 50% and is dropping fast.
Not to mention that even Bitcoin falls under the category of dedollarisation and also was created 14-15 years ago.

Same with military, weapons, influence, etc. that you mentioned.

You see inflation and capitalism didn't just hurt regular people and industries. It's hurt everything. For example a simple UAV costs a shit ton of money to manufacture inside US, and the capitalist ridden companies have turned into the biggest scammers like Lockheed Martin that is more of a thief at this point rather than a solid aerospace company.
Off the top of my head I could mention the story of manufacturing The Beast aka RQ170 that you can read in books like Drone Wars. In short hundreds of billions of dollars were wasted Lockheed Martin for R&D on failed projects for years to lead to the final "successful" one that created what US considered to be the most advanced stealth aircraft. In its first attempt to spy on Iran back in 2011, not only it was easily detected by the Iranian defenses but also it took them seconds to hack it, take full control and land it safely inside Iranian soil. They then decrypted its data, reverse engineer its technology and mass produced it at ridiculously cheap prices!
This extends to the similar aircraft like B2 Bombers and of course the so called "stealth" fighters like F35. And US Airforce is supposed to be strong and advanced lol.

There are numerous examples I could give in other fields. Take influence for example. 5 years ago nobody could imagine Saudi regime (the 51st state) going against Petrodollar let alone threatening US with "economic devastation". Today they're doing it and worse!

I'd say you're touching facts. It isn't only Chinese kids it's others they're dreaming of bigger things but western kids chasing fame from influencers. It doesn't work. They're dreaming wrong dreams. Kids in poverty in Africa, S America, MENA are beginning to dream same social media stardom dreams like western kids but they'll wake up one day.

They've done that because what they knew is TikTok is like a spy to their country. Well, these trials do happen and result like that for most of their hearing even for other companies.

Much better to just stay with trade war. There will be collateral damage if an actual war happens and we don't want that to happen. But we can't do something if that triggers one of them to start it. Both of them are doing things that might startle the other. If they can't afford anymore the trade war, it's still possible that one can just fire to the other as the sign that it has all begun.

I wouldn't be so sure.

Which country had weapons of mass destruction back then? You can't really easily say that US will lose power soon, it's too early to say that, especially when it has the best military, best weapons, has influence on the whole world and so on. But I agree with you when you say that nothing lasts forever.

That's because when I was a kid, we wanted to become scientist, astronaut, president, doctor, chemist. And now? Kids want to become KSI, Logan/Jake Paul, PewDiePie, TikToker, Youtuber, gamer. Average American wants to become that while average Chinese kid wants to become a programmer, scientist, engineer. You see the difference? America went too much into entertainment but they manage to fill the gaps by attracting a huge number of workforce and talented people from other countries.

I can still remember how funny the trial/questioning to the CEO of tiktok from the senators of USA, it seems that lack of knowledge from something is chaotic when you have the power to just shut it down forever. Tiktok complied to all they need to operate in most of countries and then USA started questioning about their national security. National security over an application that lets you take a photo of yourself with a filter and record yourself dancing. just wow.

China isn't that weak to fight back against USA. I can sense that America is ready for something, like a warfare, so they just starting any conflict with countries. It is a great restart for their economy to avoid crawling against well performing country like China. 

I remember when Trump tried to ban TikTok as that's a strikeback then against China. It's always these two that have their own strikebacks hitting each other's economy. While there have been pulling out for the manufacturers from US companies that are being sourced out to China because of cheaper labor. China sees that labor much better to be invested into their own products and workforce that shall contribute more to them for the trade that they export abroad to compete products that have always been from the US. It is true that it's not just tech that China isn't trying to compete but there are such a lot of other industries they're trying to get on like in cars, construction, etc.

Maybe but the certain thing is that US will become a normal country.

Well many of these countries with enormous power and resources have existed for thousands of years before United States was even invented. For them it would be like going back to factory settings...

I'm not predicting anything but same thing was said about a lot of other industries and countries. Like the Automotive Industry. It was once dominated by United States alone like in the 50's. Everywhere in the world the names like Ford, Cadillac, Chevrolet, etc. were heard. Today those are mostly a thing of the past as they are replaced by Toyota, Nissan, Mazda (Japanese), BMW, Audi (German), and of course the Chinese cars that are flooding US itself some like Buick under disguise of familiar names.

For example the Japanese automotive industry that is huge today, was once so tiny they would only produce a hundred or so cars and they were all "counterfeit". In early 50's with no infrastructure and no technology Japanese were basically copying American cars and were building cheap knockoffs.

In other words "counterfeiting" is not a culture, sometimes it is a step in the big journey.

These are good points and I agree, Apple is not going to see any catastrophic decrease of sales in near future but as I said above, Caddies were once "cool" too.


I never claimed it was a country-wide ban, I said "restricted the usage" without being specific because the degree of the restriction is not important in the points I'm raising here.
The argument here is the fact that for the first time in the past 30ish years where US used to be the solo world power, China has been placing such "sanctions" on US economy and they have been showing themselves up in US economy. This would have been unthinkable 5 years ago.

Otherwise a country-wide ban in China would easily wipe out between $0.5 to $1 trillion from Apple and that's only if the crash stops without Chinese market.

iPhones are not restricted from use in China, only government workers and officials are prohibited from using them (while they are at work). You must have read one of the misleading headlines that said China has banned iPhones. If that were true then Apple will lose most of their stock price because most of their manufacturing base is still in China.

Where's American influence going to be if all MENA region united? Countries are developing their economy, tech, military so they'll break way from American or European influence but it's going to take longer time. The old world order isn't finished it's in process of finishing.

"Being number one is sometimes not good, because without realizing it, number two will be able to overtake you at any time." These words are very suitable to represent the current state of America. They are very wrong if they still think that they alone can become leaders and that no country can overtake them. Economic war, technological restrictions, even using alliances, all the efforts made by America cannot stop China and other countries from continuing to develop. Even when they use their alliances such as "G7" and "NATO" they still cannot stop the development of other large countries. And that could even be a trigger for opposing countries to develop their own technology which could be much more developed than that displayed by America.
America must realize that now is no longer their time. Other countries are aware that what America is doing in the international world must end immediately and it is time to develop their economy, technology and military, and America must accept that situation.

What sells iPhone to your mind? What's its strong point? Price? Quality? I bet, it's none of these. iPhone is sold because it has Apple logo and its name is iPhone. If you own an iPhone, society thinks that you are a cool person. Almost absolutely every girl wants or owns iPhone. Why? Especially when they only use it for Facebook, Instagram and TikTok? The only option they use of this smartphone is Camera and call/messaging. They buy it because their friends think its cool and you are cool if you have latest iPhone in your hand, that's all, that's what sells iPhone. 99% of iPhone users don't need this smartphone and can easily live with $300 smartphone.
So, I don't expect this move to decrease iPhone sales in future.

Btw I hope top EU countries will find interest in new technologies and not focus solely on cars.

No, what about this Times reign, not kings ? This is a quote that one of my ausländer (He was calling himself so) colleague told me once when we were talking about Russia-Ukraine war.

There is a difference between leaders. Russia can't take care of its own country, how is it going to take care of others? But it wants to be a superpower, that's funny. Russia is the biggest country in the world but outside of Moscow and Saints Peterburg, there is absolutely no life in Russia. Check their buildings, their hospitals outside of those two cities and then compare it to random small German village for example, you'll see a huge difference.

People from developing countries seem to be benefitting from this trade war between China and the US. This war has led to the transfer of technology to other countries. Thailand, Vietnam, India, and Cambodia are now the major producers of some of the semiconductors used in the US as they stop relying on Taiwan and China. Some US companies in China moved their industries to China's neighbors which has made these nations advance in technology and increase in employment and revenue.

China is now seeking other markets after the crackdown on its investment in Europe and the US. After the sanction and legal restrictions placed on Huawei in the West, even countries like Lithuania encouraged their citizens to drop Huawei smartphones,  the Chinese company has shifted its market to Africa and the Middle East. Almost 70% of 4G networks across the African continent are handled by Huawei. Most of these developing nations need these important infrastructures and the trade war between these two world powers has made them an important market.

There is one nuance that explains why totalitarian and semi-totalitarian regimes have always been and will always be more backward, while free countries are more technologically advanced.

The free developed world gave birth to free economy, free market, and effective competition. This means that companies are willing, able and eager to provide consumers with new competitive solutions. And this means, first of all, technology. In totalitarian and close to totalitarian economies, what the economy can do is to generate something for the military-industrial complex and to provide for the elites.
The best example is the USSR. Like "the best missiles, tanks, ...." and so on. But people did not have normal clothes, primitive household appliances, everything was in short supply, produced minimally and with disgusting quality....  In addition, China is also coming with a new "party course".  It was the arrival of developed capitalism and Western technology in China that China turned from a backward agrarian country, with low-quality production, into a major high-tech economy. But Xi JinPing decided that China does not need progress and development, it needs a rigid regime, curtailment of freedoms, including economic freedoms....

Well, take for instance the "ASIC" chip development and manufacturing in Crypto currency mining.... Silicon Valley will never be able to catch up to the Asian manufacturing capabilities and the technology that they have patented. 

The US Government (NASA) are not the power house it used to be and countries like India are now landing spacecraft on the Moon. The most technologically advanced countries are now coming from South Korea and Taiwan and the most sophisticated hackers are coming from North Korea and Russia. 

I did some quick surfing on the net and found a list from Global Finance regarding the most tech-advanced countries in the world as of 2023. Based on their list South Korea ranks one (if you wanna know how they did the ranking you can check the list) while the US closely follows on rank two. Although East-Asian countries are well represented in the top 20 (with Taiwan, Japan, and Singapore) China falls on rank 38. The article explained that even though China invests a lot in research and tech production, the country fails to utilize its citizens for greater technological advancement, unlike its economic peers. With this, I would like to agree with you, although I am sure some will argue that this is not enough foundation to state that China will not make it as big as the US in terms of technology as China has been providing a lot of production parts towards big tech companies like Apple. I guess we'll just need a more conclusive article if we are going to actually make a comparison with that. Nevertheless, for now, I wouldn't go as far as saying that China will be as big as the US, perhaps they will continue to grow and develop in tech but not as quickly and as massive as the US as of now.

Link to the article/list: https://www.gfmag.com/global-data/non-economic-data/best-tech-countries

When I read stuff about Tencent and the like, I don't doubt that statement at all.  On the other hand, it seems like a lot of the tech innovations that have changed our lives have originated in the US--I've no idea whether that's going to continue or not, but I wouldn't count the US out just yet.

As far as China goes, I've got my doubts that a communist country is going to become a tech giant on their own.  They're very good at using everything that other countries have invented (not to mention their culture of counterfeiting shit), but I don't think they're going to make any major developments in tech all by themselves.  But hey, I've been very wrong before, more times than I can count so we'll see.  What I'm more worried about is how all of these countries with enormous power and resources are going to get along in the coming decades.

When two friends turn enemies the centre can no more hold as before.

In the real sense of liberalism there's no country if the world that's practicing it to the letter. I caption it as a camouflage that permeate the current age and nothing more.

It is said that when two elephants fights it is the grass that suffers but in this fight the grass have been cleared and it's the two elephants that are feeling every bit and pieces of their fight and that's what makes the fight more captivating to spectators watching from afar.

You have some very depressing worldview
Have you tried to look at what is happening from a different perspective ? Believe me - there are many positive things in the western world that are not available in those countries where "kindness, welfare, equality".... The truth is only on radio and TV
For example, North Korea is a perfect example of a developed society, and no capitalism and "fucking everyone with the help of your favorite son"
Or did I misunderstand your line and thought ?

China's holding financial leverage so they're able to retaliate. Look at the MENA region if they fell under one framework for trade they'd be able to challenge any hegemony. The old world order won't continue much longer because China isn't going to accept it. BRICS expanded to more countries so it's going in directions away from United States.

Well, it's obvious that China's grip on its companies is a world much tighter than the US'. I don't think the exodus of American brands would ever happen in China. Although there may be a somehow similar situation in the red country right now, this largely involves foreign companies. As to homegrown Chinese companies, I don't think its equally easy for them to leave the country as with homegrown US companies leaving the US. In the US, the capitalists are the ones holding the government at gunpoint. In China, it's the other way around. There's a huge difference as to where power actually resides.

When the US' tiger economy was in its infancy, child labor was rampant. Later on, standards improved as American people began living in abundance. China's story is more or less similar, although it started a bit later.

US and China are in many ways two faces of the same coin. The circumstances were different so they went on different paths of different types of dictatorship. Otherwise under same circumstances they would do exactly the same thing!

For example these days both regimes are preventing capital from exiting their country by banning any company that wishes to do so or if they insist the government bankrupts the hell out of them. China is doing it to its investment companies like those involved in real estate, US is doing it to a lot of companies including investment firms like BlackRock.
The difference is that China never claimed to be a "liberal economy or country" but US did

A couple of decades ago US economy was big and strong so they introduced strong laws against Child labor.
A couple of decades ago Chinese economy was tiny and weak so they introduced sweatshops with child (cheap) workers.
Today US economy is weakening and over the past couple of years the child labor laws in US are getting "looser" and American sweatshop are the expected reality as the violations are already up 300% according to the U.S. Department of Labor and that's the illegal cases, they are basically legalizing a lot of it so that they can get more minors (cheap labor) into their sweatshops and keep production alive for a little longer!

Yep, China is definitely not so different in the US, I only ever heard of what US done to countries that need to be 'freed' and shared some 'democracy' I never witness it because it never happened to my country. But for China, I actually witness how bad they are, their 'investment' money bring chaos in my country, they don't want local labor, China bring their own labor, lower class doesn't actually get any benefit of their investment, and even worse their latest investment, are about to create a civil war and local rebellion, they forced people to move out of their own land.

I'm not a fan of both countries, although I tend to hate China more. But I think I'm objective enough to see that the US has indeed been shooting itself in the foot for the past years, even decades. And in so many ways.

People tend to assume, for example, that cheap labor is the only factor that drives companies like Apple away from the US and into China and neighboring countries. It's certainly not.

Both China and the US are bullies not just against other countries but also against their very own people. It's certainly less severe in the US, but that it's done against a people for whom liberty is paramount, it has much more tremendous effects.

Anyway, Apple is more Chinese than American now, so...

It's a great sight to see that the world order is changing! It is indeed a multi-polar world today as it should have always been. But unfortunately, the fear of gunpowder creeped up the world since a long time. It's good that it is changing and the power is shifting back to the new world order. US has been the largest warmonger in the history of modern world and has already devastated multiple countries in Asia and Middle East. But the problem here is that Chinese are getting stronger! They are not a good number one!

China is an expansionist nation and a potential trouble maker. My forecast is - the next world war will be fought in Asia. China is just an inch away to conquer Taiwan and US will not allow that to happen. RU, India, Middle East, Japan, Australia will get directly involved into this new world war and whoever remains, will become the new world order. US needs to stop this sanction game right away! Because of their sanctions, EU people is facing energy crisis. 

I buy a samsung. No one should buy an iPhone and I am glad apple took a hit on this.  They have become a true disgrace to their original we are not the man image.

Every day I listen to the news hoping to hear about another country hurting apple and their bs gear.

BTW I own six Mac mini's and 2 iPads
 but all samsung phones.

This short video is interesting and reflects a fact.

The Newsroom - America is not the greatest country in the world anymore. (explicit)
I quoted because it's fact and even it is a comedy, it is insightful. I am unsure the White House, the USA. Congress and politicians there recognized this fact or not. If they recognized it, it is a first great step to make their America great again. Else, did not recognize it, fail to recognize it in future, they will lose their leading position.

Don't make it your habit to put your fantasies in my mouth and twist my words in a way that favors you
1. I said that "China's technological greatness" is a consequence of western investment and their technology and their EQUIPMENT.
2. I was saying that the west has drastically reduced the supply of technology to China, which will negatively impact this sector of the Chinese economy.
Moreover, the US is moving high-tech production, for example Apple is moving its assembly to a more adequate and promising country - India )
The US is banning the training of specialists from China in advanced technological educational institutions.
3. "Ban of iPhone in China for civil servants" - this is not a technological breakthrough of China, it is just restrictions for some group of buyers.

It seems that certain nations are unable to move on from their history. In fact, don't you believe the US is scoring quite a few points if we're playing "Let's shoot ourselves in the foot"?

Being a tech pioneer ought to teach one a thing or two about innovation and adaptation, right? However, here we are. China? Fuck it, they simply watched the show while relaxing and asked themselves, "Why not fill the void?" They are now producing their own tech items and even issuing their own fines as a result of certain wise moves. Hey, though, why should the US be worried? Apple only lost $200 billion as a result. Really, it's just pennies

I've always believed that if you give someone enough rope, they'll either climb to new heights or hang themselves. For prior administrations, the decision was straightforward. It's a shame, really. I had such high hopes

It's typical of you to only take out a small point in a whole topic and try to change the subject.
You have forgotten that 7 months ago in the topic about "Economic implications of a US-China-Taiwan conflict" all the arguments were China's inability to build any decent microchips and some even suggested that there is to "engineering talent" in China to do so.
Now that China is manufacturing high tech chips, of course you want to focus on Apple...

That's true but the point is that this is not the only case and it is not just China. The economic war between US and China has been going on and China is giving as much as it gets. A lot of other countries are taking actions from dedollarisation to decreasing imports from US that is hurting US economy. For example Iran jut banned the new iPhones in the country too and that's a $6 billion market.

Another point I'd like to make is that the US debt based economy is weaker and a lot more vulnerable than the Chinese production based economy. The only reason why the effects of all these things on US economy hasn't been catastrophic yet is the huge interest rate with constant money printing and exporting inflation.
In simple terms US has turned its economy into a Ponzi scheme where they create debt and sell it to Europe and countries like Japan so that this way they can keep their own economy artificially alive and hope to go back to the Old World Order to revive it for real.

Well, China and the US have been at each other's throats for a while in some ways now. However, it is true that recently US has been getting a lot of blows that are setting them up for a major disaster. And now I know some will say that it will take much much more than these blows to take the US down but that is not the main point, it's the fact that it's been happening a lot recently and it is slowly pushing the US to its vulnerable state. Of course it will take years to take the US down (why is this even a goal anyway) but the percentage of it possibly happening is already a red flag for that empire.

This is normal when China bans the use of iPhones for government-backed agencies and companies. The reason they gave was national security concerns. We have seen the US stifle important Chinese phone company Huawei for the same reason.
Come up with a hypothesis that if China bans its people from using it and stops companies from manufacturing in their country, Apple cannot die. They only lost part of it. That means they are challenging America. I believe they are not strong enough to resist the sanctions that the US will respond to. But looking back, US production now depends heavily on goods from China. This is also their dilemma.

China is next level dictatorship I feel like just in the worst way. If anyone needs BTC right now it's them, I would also add an invisible cloak to that list!!

Another proof that the US should stop playing the "global policeman", introduce sanctions against countries and use USD for punitive purposes. Or in other words they should stop pretending they're an empire and start solving real problems like poverty, homelessness, crime etc.

Its not capitalism USA practices "favored son" to the business it likes and fuck you to the ones it does not like.

Politics cause all kinds of fucked up shit and crazy ruthless businesses go right along with them.

One example is  how badly ge fucked philco over tv patents .

Or how the Facebook guy first fucked the winklevoss twins and then fucked his own partner it is amazing that the US does any legit shit at all.

Point taken. In my opinion the US has been very complacent over the years, power drunk from the fact that no other country in the past was able to keep up with it despite the predictions that China could outgrow it in the future. This led them to sanction and dismiss every other "third world country" beyond the US borders as something inferior to them, which definitely struck them back with overwhelming force. Japan has done this to them in the past with the monopoly of Japanese tech products taking over the US consumer base, they weren't able to understand and look introspectively into this for some reason and now they are suffering the consequences, and right during one of their worst economic situations yet too. It's time that we see another Superpower to the table. maybe give the US a reality check that capitalism doesn't breed competition anymore, it's breeding oligarchy and the death of commerce.

It is very "logical" to pass off the problem of a single, individual PRIVATE company, at the expense of regulatory bans, and think it is a US problem
So some index fell by some amount for some company, but China continues to accumulate US government bonds, in order to get and use more dollars, supporting the value of the dollar and the US economy.
Private business and the economy of a country are quite different entities

No world order lasts forever, not the Roman empire, not the British empire and not the U.S. All empires eventually get replaced with something fresh and different, although in reality they are all the same and they all seek the same things; power and control.

The U.S and the dollar has taken huge hits over the past few years but they are still a long way from being overthrown with BRICS posing s bigger threat than it did before. These other economies are not immune to hurdles too and will also take hits in the quest to changed the world order.

I agree that competition will bring USA down a bit, but I doubt that it would be anything that would be too sustainable and long term. Maybe Apple will not make as much money as it used to, but that doesn't make them any less powerful, nor any other USA based company that was already big. This makes them smaller, but still bigger than most. If you want to buy a phone today, and you have enough money to buy anything you want, would you buy a Chinese phone, or Apple? They are just a cheap alternative to people who can't afford apple, and even with that way too many people still prefer Apple even if that means they go into debt. I think its a thing that's happening right now, but not as big as what it seems.

So the Chinese government wants to expand the ban more of the use of iPhones to government-backed agencies and companies.

https://www.cnn.com/2023/09/07/investing/apple-stock-iphone-china-ban/index.html

This coming after apple decided to drag their feet on fixing a bunch of available exploits:
https://www.helpnetsecurity.com/2023/09/08/cve-2023-41064-cve-2023-41061/

On top of the ones that they fixed in July after months of them being exploited
https://thehackernews.com/2023/07/apple-issues-urgent-patch-for-zero-day.html

On top of all the other ones out there:
https://stack.watch/product/apple/iphone-os/
https://www.bitdefender.com/blog/hotforsecurity/apple-patches-first-zero-day-flaw-reported-in-2023-on-ios-and-macos/

I wonder why the Chinese government would want a home grown solution that they have more control of.

You can point a lot of legit fingers back at Apple as this being their fault. For DECADES they have touted security on their computers and for close to 15 years now on how much more secure their phones are then android.
But in the end, they are still very vulnerable. AND with the constant denials about issues things are starting to come back to bite them in the a$$.

No politics, not 'global economy' BS
Yes, the Chinese government can use the situation for this, but in the end more and more security people are ditching their iPhones and Apple devices in general because of the constant barrage of security problems in a closed source device.

-Dave

It is a couple of days old but it is new and I wouldn't call it "great news", it's just one of the changes in the current chaotic world. Not to mention that China is not that different from US.

Of course not, US economy is too big to "suffocate" from such a small thing. Not to mention that the Apple dump could even be recovered at some point in the near future. But this is becoming a regular thing, like a momentum and these dumps are accumulating in different fields. In other words the case of Apple dump is an example and it shows the high degree of vulnerability that US economy has in facing sanctions.
It's not going to be overnight either, like the dedollarisation. Dollar that once was used in 80-90% of the international trades, it is now barely reaching half of them as countries continue dumping it.

Sorry you didn't like my tone, feel free to read the businessinsider article, it is saying pretty much the same thing.

It's not all cheap and substandard. In fact I see Chinese economy as a very genius one that sees the "demand" in the world and creates the appropriate "supply" for it at cheap production cost. The reason why a lot of their products are substandard is because that's what their customers want.
If you check out the population of the biggest trade partners of China (US, South Korea, Japan, Taiwan in descending order of trade size), these countries have large number of middle and lower class citizens who are living hand to mouth and prefer affordable products. So that's what China manufactures.

But that's not all China manufactures, in other fields and products you can find top quality competitive products too. Off the top of my head their car industry which is at this point manufacturing competitive vehicles which some speculate is going to put a lot of big names out of business in the near future.

I didn't give "Kudos to China" and I disagree. That war has not ended yet to call its winner and also to this point there has been no winners. Both sides are still fighting and both sides are hurting in different ways. For example Chinese economy in certain places has gone bankrupt and some private companies were literally swallowed by the government to keep them afloat.
The difference between China and US is that China is fighting US while US is fighting majority of the world.

Thanks for putting it this way specially using these terms because US did the same exact thing to China in a large number of relationships. From Huawei only because it was manufactured in China to the recent sanctions on numerous Chinese companies just because BlackRock wanted to invest in them.

In other words my tone is not anti-US, I'm simply calling out sabotage, back-stabs, betrayals, and a lot of other shenanigans United States has been pulling on the rest of the world. Otherwise it's double standard

I blame rich mother fuckers all over the wolrd.

This shit has gone on for thousands of years and will continue on.

The who has a song with these lyrics in it

“meet the new boss same as the old boss…”

the issue is people that push and struggle hard to be a big boss are basically assholes.

american 🇺🇸

china 🇨🇳

russia 🇷🇺

england 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿

all the leaders are mostly assholes that wanted power and fought to be a boss.

so we need to keep this in mind.

I'm simply not surprised by the OP's anti-US tone, I think I'm used to it now, and what I know is that the US will always bounce back. "Bet against the US in the long run and you regret it." China has grown nerves now, thanks to their cheap and substandard products and the poverty in the world that makes such products lucrative.

Nevertheless, what I will agree with you is that the world's order is changing, perhaps I should say, it's trying to change, but can this attempt truly effect the change? That is another question you might not be sincere about yet. I read with surprise how you seemed to give China a Kudos of the 2018 trade war. What I know as a trader myself because I follow it was that the winner of the trade war during Trump's era is the US, and it's obvious.

As for the main subject matter, what I see in the issue of Apple losing $200B so fast is my initial fear of China. China has betrayed another relationship and is merely selfish here, a backstabber, and using its economic strength that has not been held for as much as the US does to dominate. This is just an economic sabotage in which a country because others have helped you develop, you just woke up one day and wanted to take everything all to yourself.

Despite the riches of China, what contribution do they have in the world when it comes to financial aid, global research, disease control, climate change, reasonable lending, true leadership and many more? I've seen China as a country that has nothing to offer the world but only China. What happened is an attestation to it, but the anti-US mindsets will not let people see it. If it were to be China that was in the place of the US for these centuries, they would have shown their tyranny and monopoly in full to the world and would have cautioned the development of other countries because they will always want to be in control and have it all.

This is a wake-up call for the US and the US companies, they shouldn't be too trusting, leaving your country to develop another country's economy to build them strong. This news only caught the market by surprise, and as you can see, Apple's shares are recovering gradually till Friday. In all, I see this as a challenge to the US and I would rather sympathise with them than mock them.

You have shared great news, but I doubt if it is new. I mean, of course, the news is of September 9, but what I meant here is the riot between China and the US. China has banned the usage of a lot of US products and ad services in its country, like social media apps. We cannot access YouTube, WhatsApp, etc. directly. Even if they have their own search engine, I think that's Baidu.

I said in the first line that the news might be old because one of my professors told us a few days ago that China has not allowed the usage of iPhones there. That's why I thought it might be old, but maybe the ban is from way back when, but the data released yesterday about how much they lost

Well, coming back to the losses, I do not really think the US will suffocate from such losses. I mean, that's not that big, but yeah, I totally agree with your point that the US is not the only tech nation here. But sometimes I wonder if the biggest wonders, like all the domains, are mentioned by them. They knew almost everything (in some conditions) one was searching for. We are basically using their product, knowingly or unknowingly. I always wonder, as a citizen of my country, if we could make some cool innovations that would make us independent of them. But I am not a good developer, and I hope someone else will do it.

https://www.businessinsider.com/apple-200-billion-drop-sign-post-us-tech-future-near-2023-9

The biggest mistake any decision makers in any country can make these days is not realizing the World Order has already changed and to fail to adapt to the New World Order as quickly as possible.

The most obvious example in United States that is still clinging to the Old World Order, desperately trying to remain the solo hegemony in today's multi-polar world.
Of course this change didn't happen overnight, the World Order has been transitioning for many years while many have been pushing US over the edge and down to the pit. But in my opinion the last nails in that coffin were put there by the US regime itself and out of pure stupidity, specially in the previous two administrations.

For example take the trade war with China that started on January 2018. Before that the Chinese companies didn't feel threatened enough to ever bother to start R&D of high tech stuff since they could freely import them from US manufacturers. So China remained dependent on United States.
But as the US regime kept "sanctioning" China, China started going domestic. Now for example the Chinese smart phone companies are manufacturing microchips (that they used to import) domestically.

Here is the problem, this move not only creates a serious and super cheap competition in global markets against American products that can easily replace them and devastate those companies, but also it now gives China the capability to strike back which brings us to the recent "sanctions" China placed on US, restricting usage of iPhones in China. The result? Apple got dumped $200 billion in a blinking of a eye.
It doesn't stop there, we have already seen over the past year+ the worsening US recession is also hurting the Silicon Valley and the tech sector as its first and biggest victim with banks that keep on collapsing.

This signals the start of a new era where tech giants are no longer going to be American. Meanwhile tech is not the only field and China is not the only country US keeps sanctioning...