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Soundwave on 12 February 2016
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DM235 said:
CGI-Quality said:

They are? Does anyone has sources for this? I've asked once already, but based on what, do they have enough to buy MS? Do people REALLY believe that Apple could, one day, buy MS? Really?

Apple has $16.7b in cash, $21.4b in short term investments, $24.6b in receivables, and $177.7b in long term investments.  For the sake of argument, if they were to use all of that, that would give them $240.4b.

Microsoft's market capitalization is $393b.  To buy a controlling share in Microsoft, you would need to buy 50% + 1 shares, or roughly $200b worth.  Generally, when you do you do a buyout, you have to do it at a premium.  A 20% premium would be $240b.  So technically, Apple has enough available to buy Microsoft, even without resorting to a stock swap.  

Having said that, this approach is not really possible, as Apple most likely doesn't have easy access to those long term investments (or they may come at a penalty if they are cashed out early).  Apple could do a cash + stock deal, where they spend $30b in cash and $210b in stock (where eash MS investor would get 1 Apple share per 2 MS shares, using today's rates).  Apple would need to convince their shareholders that this is a good deal, as $210b is just under half the value of Apple.

This whole thing would also have to get approval from the SEC, and considering that both Apple and MS make operating systems, this would essentially give Apple a monopoly.  The SEC would most likely block this from ever happening.

And no, I honestly think this will not happen.

Good post. But it does show it's not impossible, especially if MS' market cap dropped, but you're right the SEC would likely block any type of move like this on the grounds of it being a monopoly. 

Sony could buy Nintendo or Sony fairly easily, it's just not worth it to them. Video game console sales are piddly compared to the iPhone sales they're used to. 

A hugely successful, usually market leading console sells maybe 100 million units in 5-6 years and low profit margin (sometimes a net loss). The iPhone sells 74-75 million units in *three months* sometimes (a quarter) at a huge profit margin.

Sony isn't exactly that attractive outside of the a few divisions. Nintendo just does video games. 

Not really worth it. If Apple really wanted to make a game console they easily could do so themselves and probably sell 40-60 million fairly easily if they took it seriously. They would get a ton of third party support. 

If they wanted to get into the game business I'd reccomend to them to buy a third party company like a Square-Enix for about $3-$4 billion, which would much cheaper than buying a Nintendo. An Apple console with S-E exclusive and lots of third party support, competent hardware, and lots of marketing would be a far cheaper way for Apple to get into the console biz if that's what they want, but I don't think they want that. It's just not lucrative enough of a business for them to care.