Homepage / Currency / The new old thing
Amazon says this Prime Day was its biggest shopping event ever Kudlow says President Trump is 'so dissatisfied' with China trade talks that he is keeping the pressure on As stocks regain their footing, an ominous warning looms Goldman Sachs downgrades Clorox to sell, says valuation is 'unsustainably high' How Satya Nadella has spurred a tripling of Microsoft's stock price in just over four years Kudlow says economic growth could top 4% for 'a quarter or two,' more tax cuts could be coming The one chart that explains Netflix’s stunning comeback US housing starts plunge 12% in June to a nine-month low Aerospace titans Boeing and Airbus top $110 billion in orders at Farnborough Target uses Prime Day to its advantage, logging its 'biggest online shopping day' so far this year Billionaire Marc Lasry sees bitcoin reaching up to $40,000 as it becomes more mainstream and easier to trade These are the 10 US airports where you're most likely to be hacked Amazon shares slightly higher as investors await Prime Day results Wreck of Russian warship found, believed to hold gold worth $130 billion A bullish ‘phenomenon’ in bond market is weeks away from fading, top credit strategist says Stocks making the biggest moves premarket: MS, GOOGL, TXN, UAL, NFLX & more Twitter shares up 50% since late April means most upside priced in, analyst says in downgrade EU fines Google $5 billion over Android antitrust abuse Mortgage applications fall 2.5% as buyers struggle to find affordable homes America may not have the tools to counter the next financial crisis, warn Bernanke, Geithner and Paulson Investors are getting spooked as the risk of a no-deal Brexit rises EU expected to fine Google $5 billion over Android antitrust abuse Ex-FBI chief James Comey urges Americans to vote for Democrats in midterm elections Elon Musk apologizes to British cave diver following baseless 'pedo guy' claim Disney, Comcast and Fox: All you need to know about one of the biggest media battles ever Xiaomi shares notch new high after Hong Kong, mainland China stock exchanges reach agreement The trade war is complicating China's efforts to fix its economy European markets set for a strong open amid earnings; Google in focus Hedge fund billionaire Einhorn places sixth in major poker tournament The biggest spender of political ads on Facebook? President Trump Asian stocks poised to gain after Fed's Powell gives upbeat comments; dollar firmer Stocks are setting up to break to new highs Not all FAANG stocks are created equal EU ruling may be too little, too late to stop Google's mobile dominance Cramer explains how Netflix's stock managed to taper its drop after disappointing on earnings Airbnb condemns New York City's 'bellhop politics,' threatens legal retaliation Amazon sellers say they were unfairly suspended right before Prime Day, and now have two bad choices Investor explains why 'duller' tech stocks can have better returns than 'high-flying' tech names Elon Musk is 'thin-skinned and short-tempered,' says tech VC Texas Instruments CEO Brian Crutcher resigns for violating code of conduct Google Cloud Platform fixes issues that took down Spotify, Snapchat and other popular sites Uber exec: We want to become the 'one stop' transportation app 'What a dumb hearing,' says Democrat as Congress grills tech companies on conservative bias Amazon shares rebound, report says Prime Day sales jumped 89 percent in first 12 hours of the event How to put your medical history on your iPhone in less than 5 minutes Investment chief: Watch these two big events in 2018 Even with Netflix slowing, the market rally is likely not over Cramer: Netflix subscriber weakness debunks the 'sky's the limit' theory on the stock Netflix is looking at watch time as a new area of growth, but the competition is stiff Why Nobel laureate Richard Thaler follows Warren Buffett's advice to avoid bitcoin Rolls-Royce is developing tiny 'cockroach' robots to crawl in and fix airplane engines After Netflix plunge, Wall Street analysts forecast just tame returns ahead for the once high-flying FANG group Roku shares rise after analyst raises streaming video company's price target due to customer growth China is investing 9 times more into Europe than into North America, report reveals Amazon says US Prime Day sales 'so far bigger than ever' as glitch is resolved Netflix is on pace for its worst day in two years US lumber producers see huge opportunity, rush to expand San Francisco to consider tax on companies to help homeless Homebuilder sentiment, still high, stalls as tariffs, labor and land drive up costs Powell backs more rate hikes as economy growing 'considerably stronger' Netflix history is filled with big stock declines – like today – followed by bigger rebounds Intel shares get downgraded by Evercore ISI due to rising competition from Nvidia, AMD Petco aims to reinvent the pet store with something you can't buy online Genetic testing is coming of age, but for consumers it's buyer beware Tech 'FAANG' was the most-crowded trade in the world heading into the Netflix implosion, survey shows Netflix weak subscriber growth may indicate a 'maturity wall' that could whack the stock even more: Analyst This chart may be predicting the bull market's demise Wall Street says Netflix's stock plunge is a ‘compelling’ buying opportunity because the streaming giant ‘never misses twice’ Tesla sinks after Musk tweets, again Boeing announces new division devoted to flying taxis Stocks making the biggest move premarket: NFLX, UNH, GS, AMZN, WMT & more Deutsche Bank downgrades Netflix, but says big subscriber miss is not 'thesis changing' IBM is experimenting with a cryptocurrency that’s pegged to the US dollar North Korea and Zimbabwe: A friendship explained Virgin Galactic spinoff Orbit to launch rockets from the UK with space deal Artificial intelligence will create more jobs than it destroys? That’s what PwC says ‘Treasonous’ Trump and ‘Putin’s poodle:' Scathing headlines follow the Trump-Putin summit China’s fintech companies offer ‘enormous’ opportunity, investment manager says Trump's performance at summit with Putin was 'unprecedented,' experts say Walmart and Microsoft link up on cloud technology as they both battle Amazon European stocks seen mixed amid earnings; Fed’s Powell to address Congress How I knew I should quit my day job and run my start-up full-time: Viral website founder China's stocks have been trounced, but the trade war may ultimately be good news for those shares Billionaire tech investor Peter Thiel bets on crypto start-up Block.one Asian shares subdued open after mixed close on Wall Street; energy stocks under pressure Amazon cloud hits snags after Amazon Prime Day downtime Netflix isn't doomed by one quarter unless people start questioning the long-term investor thesis Tech stocks set to sink on Tuesday after rough evening for ‘FANG’ Netflix plummets after missing big on subscriber growth This wristband lets humans control machines with their minds The U.S. has a rocky history convincing Russia to extradite computer criminals Amazon suffers glitches at the start of Prime Day Jeff Bezos is now the richest man in modern history 'The United States has been foolish': Read Trump and Putin's full exchange Goldman Sachs recommends these 5 highly profitable companies — including Nvidia — to combat rising inflation Goldman Sachs releases 'tactical' stock picks for this earnings season Three red flags for Netflix ahead of its earnings report The bond market may be raising recession fears, but don't expect one anytime soon Cramer: Banks are 'making fortunes' but are still as hated as they were during the financial crisis Putin told Trump at summit: Russia never meddled in US election

Currency

The new old thing

APPLE has a new hit device, so popular that it has sold out across most of America and Britain. If you order it online it takes six weeks to arrive. “Best Apple product in a long time,” sings one online review. Useful and (of course) slickly designed, it enjoys the highest consumer satisfaction of any Apple product in history, according to a study by two firms, Creative Strategies and Experian.

Such enthusiasm must be bittersweet for Apple’s bosses. The gadget in question is AirPods, a set of wireless headphones that look a lot like Apple’s traditional ear buds, just without a wire. Priced at $159, AirPods could become a business worth billions of dollars, like the Apple Watch, a wearable device that Apple started selling in 2015. But headphones are hardly the transformative, vastly profitable innovation that many have been waiting for.

  • How do you pronounce “GIF”?

  • The involuntary bumping of flyers is likely to be outlawed

  • An exhibition at the Design Museum in London shows colour in a new light

  • How whales started filtering food from the sea

  • Foreign reserves

  • Has “one country, two systems” been a success for Hong Kong?

That wait started only a few years after its biggest blockbuster launched. On June 29th 2007 the iPhone first went on sale. Since then Apple has sold some 1.2bn phones and notched up more than $740bn in sales from the bestselling tech gadget in history (see chart). Two-thirds of Apple’s $216bn in sales in 2016 came from the iPhone.

Atop a hill there is usually nowhere to go but down. Questions about the future of the iPhone and whether Apple will ever design another product to match it pursue the company. The relentless rise of smartphone ownership is slowing, with around two-fifths of the global population now owning one. Apple is also facing more competition, especially in China (its second most important market after North America) where sales have been declining, lending weight to fears that Apple is experiencing “peak iPhone”.

Even though Apple has been spending $10bn a year on research and development, “people aren’t banking on innovation”, says Amit Daryanani ofRBC Capital Markets, a bank. That helps to explain why the firm’s shares are valued on a price-to-earnings ratio of around ten times its forecast 2018 earnings (stripping out cash), lower than the 12-14 times that the information-technology industry trades on.

Certainly, Apple’s attempts to diversify away from its hit product have been flawed. One disappointment has been television, worth some $260bn globally. ItsTV offering is a cable box that is little more than a portal to content from other firms, such as Netflix, not the disruptive offering that Apple executives promised.

There is also justified scepticism about another possible avenue for growth: personal transportation, an industry that is worth some $10trn. In June, for the first time, Tim Cook, Apple’s chief executive, publicly discussed the firm’s ambition to develop an autonomous-car system. Apple could surely design a sleek car, but the big shift is away from ownership toward transportation as a service. Routing cars to specific places, as Uber does, is a leap.

Many people believe that Apple could expand in health care, on which people spend an estimated $8trn each year globally. Today Apple allows people to store their fitness information on their devices and offers a platform for developers to create health and fitness apps. But it is as yet unclear what Apple’s edge will be. Its stance on consumers’ privacy, which it protects more assiduously than other technology giants, may be an advantage. But dealing with a complex web of companies and reams of red tape, as any foray into health care would require, would again be a big departure from what it is used to.

Part of Apple’s difficulty in finding the next big thing may be that it is still steered by a small, insular group of executives who have mostly been at the firm since the 1990s. They include Mr Cook, who took over shortly before the death of Steve Jobs, the firm’s adored founder, in 2011. Apple is not good at hiring people from outside who could help bring new skills and ideas. Other companies have a far better record of bringing outsiders into the fold. Amazon’s Prime video offering and the work that formed the basis for Echo, its home speaker, drew on newcomers’ expertise.

Yet Apple will have every chance to adapt because of the enduring strength of its hit product. The iPhone business will not grow as rapidly as in the past but it will remain more important for far longer than people think, says Ben Thompson of Stratechery, a research firm. The iPhone 8, due to be unveiled in September, is likely to be innovative enough to encourage around 250m-300m iPhone users to upgrade, driving a new “supercycle” of sales.

Katy Huberty of Morgan Stanley, a bank, goes as far as to say that “for Apple the next iPhone will be the iPhone.” The inclusion of augmented reality (AR), which superimposes digital information onto real-world images, for example, is likely to drive strong future iPhone sales. Apple is likely to include a 3D camera in the iPhone, and it recently said it would begin operating ARKit, a platform for software developers to design new apps that integrate AR. This step is akin to when Apple launched its app store in 2008. That set off a wave of innovation in mobile apps, which in turn gave consumers more reasons to buy iPhones. One early experiment is by the retailerIKEA, which is working on an iPhone and iPad app that lets users point their phone and see what furniture looks like superimposed in a particular space.

By encouraging app developers to start work onAR now, Apple will have a two- or three-year head start on Google’s Android operating system, says Tim Bajarin of Creative Strategies. Google has launched anAR platform, called Tango, but it is only available on two devices, the Lenovo Phab 2 Pro and the Asus ZenfoneAR, which have few users. If Apple can keep a lead on integratingAR into its software, that would also give users a reason to keep on preferring the iPhone over cheaper smartphones. This will be particularly helpful in China, where local brands such as Vivo andOPPO have taken share—last summerOPPO’s R9 phone, which costs just $400, overtook the iPhone in the country.

Other revenue streams are tied in part to the iPhone’s success. One area of strong growth—if the base of iPhone users continues to expand—will be Apple’s services business, which includes revenue from app sales, cloud storage, insurance of Apple devices and more. Services are already Apple’s second-largest business, having overtaken personal computers in 2016.

Spec for smart specs

Another promising new business is smart glasses, which Apple has begun referencing in its patent applications. These will overlay digital information onto the real world without the need to look down at a screen. Work that Apple has done in developing AirPods, the Apple Watch andARKit, such as waterproofing and elongating battery life, are the building blocks for smart glasses, says Benedict Evans of Andreessen Horowitz, a venture-capital firm. Many reckon that glasses may render phones useless, but for a long while, glasses will only work with the help of the computing power of a nearby smartphone.

Yet it may be another question entirely—its use of data—that matters most to Apple’s next decade. Apple has made a point of distinguishing itself from firms like Alphabet, Google’s parent company, which mine user data to target ads online. It has made a great effort to make ad blockers easy for users to install, for example. But data are increasingly central to designing the smartest software; Apple already risks lagging behind in areas such as voice recognition and predictive software if it remains inflexible about hoovering up consumers’ information. Whether to prioritise privacy ahead of innovation may turn out to be Mr Cook’s most important decision yet.

Source: economist
The new old thing

Comments are closed.