“It’s a good thing for Apple, because otherwise the U.S. profit picture would look a lot different,” Jeff Cox reports for CNBC. “The Cupertino, California-based tech giant made an outsized contribution to fourth-quarter earnings, adding nearly double its portion of the S&P 500, according to an analysis of figures as about three-quarters of the index has reported.”
“Ultimately, Apple accounted for about 7 percent of total earnings, or $2.04, for the quarter, according to calculations from Goldman Sachs,” Cox reports. “That was more than the contribution of Exxon Mobil, Microsoft and General Electric combined.”
“It’s all the more noteworthy because Apple comprises 3.83 percent of the total S&P 500 market cap, or just more than half its earnings contribution,” Cox reports. “The Apple numbers are significant because they exemplify the extent to which overall profit is on the decline thanks to a slump in energy profits, despite previous lofty expectations for 2015.”
Read more in the full article here.
That’s just sad.
But Obama tells us he saved the economy.
From the article:
Most of the decline is attributable to energy, with companies hit by falling oil prices expected to post massive profit drops in the quarters ahead—including a 61 percent decline in the first quarter—before finally leveling off in the fourth quarter.
That’s right, George, damn that Fartbongo Kenyan Muslim, he should be doing everything possible to boost oil prices. There’s nothing this country needs more than skyrocketing oil prices. Damn Fartbongo for not guaranteeing $5 a gallon gas.
Don’t give Obama any ideas. He might use that pen and phone of his to put a $3.00 shovel ready reinvestment fee on every gallon of gas thus guaranteeing $5.00 a gallon gas. “You’re Welcome!” – O.
Amusing, however you’d think if the economy was recovering under Obama, falling oil prices would show up as profits elsewhere and even out and even possibly improve the situation in numerous other companies.
Why is that not happening, slick?
I, for one, am using my fuel savings to pay off credit cards & make extra mortgage payments. I’m not going to rush out & buy a Gas Guzzling vehicle since we all know that these low prices are not going to last.
It takes time for decreasing fuel and raw materials costs to manifest itself in the form of quartly profits in other sectors of the economy. In addition, a rapid decline in oil prices also has some negative economic impacts, such as reductions in investments in oil and gas explorations, the shutting down of facilities with a higher cost of production, and layoffs.
I am not saying that the U.S. (or world) economy is rosy, or that the Administration or Congress has done a good job in managing the U.S. economy. But your glib assessment is indicative of a biased and overly simplistic viewpoint on national economics.
This is the same type of weak and self-deceptive reasoning that is leading people to deny that climate change is taking place at all, rather than acknowledging the near-consensus scientific opinion and evidence that climate change is occurring and investigating the *degree* to which human activities are contributing to it relative to natural variations. In the end, regardless of the source, climate change is serious business for humanity. In a likelihood-consequence assessment where the consequence is potentially very serious, you don’t want to take chances with gut feel.
Slick…
What would oil prices be if Obama had not probibited any oil exploration on any public lands and had seized vast state lands and put them under the national drilling bans? Of course he also prevented the Keystone pipeline from bringing Canadian oil into the US which also hurt overall oil prices. Obama is not shy about stating how much he hates fossil fuels so don’t act like he wants low oil prices.
Obama’s consistent position on oil exploration hasn’t affected the price of oil at all. No oil company has any financial incentive to drill in the arctic at this time. Nor is there any incentive for the USA to transport Canadian tar to oil export terminals in the USA. There is only one thing an American president can do to fundamentally change the price of a worldwide traded commodity: he can petition Congress to stop the ridiculous subsidies to domestic producers. The reason that corn, soybean, oil, etc are all so much cheaper in the USA than in the rest of the world is because of corporate welfare that large corrupt organizations have driven into national policy. Without these grants and subsidies, the price of oil would actually reflect the cost to produce it … but then, Kent, you would have to be willing to support a fair market to do this.