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posted by martyb on Tuesday January 08 2019, @06:02AM   Printer-friendly
from the down-from-a-trillion dept.

Amazon is now the USA's most valuable publicly-traded company by market value:

Amazon's ended trading Monday with a market value of about $797 billion, compared with Microsoft's $783 billion. Apple, which had been part of a close three-way race for the seat, is now down to about $702 billion in market value after plunging last week on the news of its weak iPhone sales. Google parent company Alphabet has surpassed Apple with a market value of about $748 billion.

Previously: Microsoft Overtakes Amazon as Second Most Valuable U.S. Company


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  • (Score: 2) by FatPhil on Tuesday January 08 2019, @10:24AM (5 children)

    by FatPhil (863) <pc-soylentNO@SPAMasdf.fi> on Tuesday January 08 2019, @10:24AM (#783609) Homepage
    The debt-laden major economies are busy devaluing their own fiat currencies, and one might even take the leap to say that repeated inflation of the money supply, such as QEs 1, 2, and 3, were debasing the currency. Almost everything else is looking like a bubble. So that doesn't leave many options. Fixed interest is little better than cash under your matress (which is 0% fixed interest, after all). Gold and silver are considered safe haven currencies, one that people traditionally flock to when crashes loom in other markets, and in particular G/S is very high right now (>80), so silver is looking like a good buy. I wouldn't expect anything to kick off for perhaps even over a year though, but all of the technical indicators are there (2s10s strongly points to a 2020 recession). Beware market manipulation, thought, JPM should be have their licence to trade revoked, they're practically criminal in this regard. Sovereign states of course prefer their reserves in gold, and there's a large influx of gold into Russia and China currently - they're starting to hoard, so perhaps their influence will mean that there's more motion possible in gold than silver as supplies tighten. Silver's volatility is higher, if you want to be more active and speculate as well as invest.

    Skin in the game? Yes. I'm trying to BTFD as we speak. If you feel tempted to dabble, then the online marketplace with the lowest trading overheads (half a percent at low volumes) and way way cheapest storage fees (about a quarter of anyone else's fees) is bullionvault, and if you use my account id as a referer, I'd be most grateful: http://www.bullionvaultaffiliate.com/ASDF0000/en

    I don't believe it's going to the moon, but that's not what I'm looking for - I do want a safe haven investment in simple terms - I'm wary of pretty much everything else. Even if it's heading south, it has enough volatility to be possible to short a profit.

    My biggest single investment, however, was in a local brewery that is run by people who have a proven track record at getting the business side of things right, and who have employed extremely skillful brewing/lab staff. They're exporting all round the world already, have a tip-top reputation, and are expanding as they can't supply the current demand. No divvies for a while (lots of loans to pay off due to expansion), but I'm considering that a medium-to-long term growth investment. Of course, I was at the right place at the right time in order to be able to be part of that - so the only recommendation I can map that onto is "be lucky".
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  • (Score: 2) by driverless on Tuesday January 08 2019, @11:00AM (2 children)

    by driverless (4770) on Tuesday January 08 2019, @11:00AM (#783613)

    For those who aren't quite following all this financial talk, this illustration [wp.com] may help to clarify what's being discussed.

    • (Score: 2) by FatPhil on Tuesday January 08 2019, @11:52AM (1 child)

      by FatPhil (863) <pc-soylentNO@SPAMasdf.fi> on Tuesday January 08 2019, @11:52AM (#783626) Homepage
      90% of the movement of value in the world is the movement of bits of paper containing nothing but promises, not actual things. It's wise to familiarise yourself with how that system works, because it affects everyone in the world.

      If you're not familiar with the concept of debasement, for example, you're nearly 2000 years behind the times - you've got some catch-up reading to do.

      Do not think for one second that I have any respect for the people who have constructed the modern world this way, quite the opposite, I abhor some of the instruments that have been invented in my lifetime, some are wholly designed around relying on bigger idiots, for example. Madoff wasn't the bad egg, he was just playing the same game as everyone else, but badly enough to not get away with it. However, it's pertinent to understand how the system is constructed, and some of the argot that those who work in the field use to describe what's going on. Some of the terms originally had some intrinsic sense, but now there's no real market of real things the abstraction has made them seem like gobbledygook. Read up on the origins, and you'll realise plenty of it is not mystical incantations. (But plenty is too.)
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      • (Score: 2) by HiThere on Tuesday January 08 2019, @04:57PM

        by HiThere (866) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday January 08 2019, @04:57PM (#783730) Journal

        Actually, I believe that debasing currency is nearly as old as currency. IIUC it dates back to the times before coining money was practiced...though in that time it was mainly unofficial actions of officials. Shaving bars of gold that had the king's seal on them, mixing in other metals, etc.

        OTOH, the king's seal was important as a guarantee of purity, because the open market was full of people who would give short weight or mixtures of metals.

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  • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday January 08 2019, @12:52PM (1 child)

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday January 08 2019, @12:52PM (#783629) Journal

    Why invest in bullion when you can invest in gold miners?

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    • (Score: 2) by FatPhil on Wednesday January 09 2019, @12:31AM

      by FatPhil (863) <pc-soylentNO@SPAMasdf.fi> on Wednesday January 09 2019, @12:31AM (#783914) Homepage
      Long story. Investing in shares in mining companies has its ups and its downs as much as any other limited-resource primary industry. The big wins come from the big finds, and there's no way looking at any larger picture will help you predict when those happen. So basically it's a bit of a crapshoot. Many mines are in unstable countries - even more unstable than Trumpistan - so there are high risks too. Are you an Aussie? I've read positive things about many Australian prospects, maybe one might prove you right. Many mining equities are dipping currently, so it might seem a good time to go in, but with the US stock exchange as it currently is, they could be collatoral damage when the bubble of almost everything bursts. So, not for me, but clearly others think differently.
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