Microsoft still beats Apple in cash and investments, for now

I am not sure why it is a good thing to have that much cash in the bank .. in fact I think it is a bad sign for a company.
As a shareholder you want either to be paid from that money or want to see it go somewhere usefull .. explore new business markets .. invest some. Of course having a little security cushion in place is fine .. but Apples is a little big.
As a customer it makes me feel that I got rip off to be honest. Apparently a good chunk of my money was not reflected in any costs but was just making the company rich .. sitting on 40$ billion make the the company appear greedy.

At least Microsoft and Intel seem to have some ups and downs in there, trying to balance there cash .. for Apple and Google it is hard to tell.

Apple really should get some of that money and do something great with it. Why not take some risk and throw out the iPad for a 100-200$ less and make the plattform thrive. Instead they charge us almost twice of what the hardware is worth and 30$ extra for the iWorks apps. Lame. Greedy.

T.

There is a difference between Microsoft and the rest. Microsoft is the only business in that group that kicks out dividends to its shareholders. That will lower the amount of cash on hand. Nice try on the business commentary. MSNBC does better.

There is a key difference between Microsoft and the rest. Microsoft kicks out dividends to its shareholders. Apple and the rest don't. That will lower the amount of cash on hand. So nice try at the commentary ...

nicholson789@gmail.co

Your chart is misleading. it appears that the 4 companies together have $40 billion. A bar graph would have been a better choice. As it stands now, the chart makes it look like Microsoft had no money in the bank from late '08 till early '09.

I saw some numbers recently that looked like Apple was approaching MS in revenue. I think. When you consider how little room MS has for growth in key products like Windows and Office it looks good for Apple. Apple has all the room in the world to grow - can't wait to see the share price in 2-3 years.

This is useless penis-measurement.
Cash on hand for MSFT was reduced because it implies the company isn't investing it's profits well enough (either re-investing in company or purchasing other companies).

Apple's large hoard - what use is it doing them? It's certainly security for when the bad times may come, and it's clear that Apple has no problems innovating (so the shareholder pressure is low)... but what does this mean to it's employees, shareholders, or customers other than it's a big number?