Who's afraid of the big bad Microsoft?

[JLaSoul]

I'll admit, bill gates is no one to mess with, he nows his business, but as for afraid, HELL TO THE NAW!

[kaliraver]

All I have to say about M$ is F*** em'.

[McLovin]

Originally Posted by sj001

Most of them, and donating massive sums of money results in very large tax breaks.

Exactly, none of this charity is because they have this big caring heart, it's for tax write-off's

[Rustmonsteru]

Originally Posted by Musashi

Gates does donate alot; all celebrities do.

When you make a lot of money it's worth your while tax-wise to gift. You can give to a worthy cause or let the government have it.

[maximiza]

I can't say I could trust William Henry Gates III. He has worked with China and helped them censor and capture bloggers. He can be all things to all people which actually is a trait of some evil beings in religion. The charity is good but I have read that when he throws money around in a certain parts/regions of Africa all the doctors flock to that region and other unlucky regions suffer. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. This group is the unelecteed part of the goverment where all the big and mighty along with elected officals make deals and create the reality for all of us underlings. I can't really say he is a non for profit type of guy.

[tommyD]

Originally Posted by Blu-Ray Buckeye

You say that as if it's only accountants who use it. Market Cap is the #1 accepted way to value any public company. When companies are bought out or taken over it is via the stock and it always comes at a premium to the current share price otherwise no deal will happen. There are many ways to calculate what the value should be, but all are open to debate and less accepted for public discussion.

Exactly the point - thanks Buckeye. The value of anything is the amount of money required to purchase it. In the case of MS, you would have to buy $330B worth of stock to purchase the company, all its assets, etc. Of course it is naive to say that the value would be $330B exactly if someone opened their wallet to shell out the cash to buy MS (it could go up if investors are reluctant to sell, it could go down if the reason for the takeover is because all the investors are trying to back out simultaneously). But $330B is today's pricetag (and no BOGO offer here).

[shug7272]

Originally Posted by actionhank

In case you didnt know the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is one of the largest charitable foundations in the world. 1 out of every 3 dollars spend towards fighting HIV comes from the Gates foundation

Its very easy to give away small percents of your income. I do it everyday to the homless and needy. The point is his small percent is huge. Hes no great savior. He could give away 75% of his income and still be sick rich. So give me a break with what a saint he is. All (most) rich people give to the needy, im sure out of the good of their hearts and not in any way for publicity.

[actionhank]

Originally Posted by Blu-Ray Buckeye

First of all, 8% is pretty close to 10%. secondly, obviously I am directly comparing to other major currencies and in this particular case the Yuan... to say the exchange between the 2 will move at roughly 10% isn't too unreasonable.

8% is 200 basis points from 10%! Thats considered a lot in economics and statistics.

Originally Posted by Blu-Ray Buckeye

Secondly, I said the primary currency of their holdings. If you think Gates isn't weighted more heavily toward dollar back assets and rising Chinese billionaires aren't more heavily weighted toward Yuan then you're not thinking straight.

Nice way to try to be literal and miss the entire point.

Well yeah he probably holds a lot of dollar denominated securites, not "dollar backed assets." Remember financial assets (like a stock) are backed by real assets (like a factory), not by dollars. Thats why nominal exchange rates matter little unless you're gonna be a tourist. What matters is inflation, thats when prices (including wages) rise, the value of a dollar goes down. Now a weak dollar can lead to high inflation because of the rising price of imports, but so far that hasn't happened as indicated by the PCE deflator or the CPI (core). In fact the PCE deflator is expected to be lower this 4th quarter year over year

[tru_to_blu]

M$ is out for one thing and one thing only,$$$$$THE$$$$MONEY$$$$$$$$$, and they dont care about cheating people.

[2blu2]

I guess because I am new and my post was so long the mods need to approve it first.

Here is short version. Revenue is only 1 stat and not the most important.

MSFT
Market Cap $342.2B
Cash & Shrt T Inv $ 23.4B
Total Assets $ 63.2B
Total Debt $ 0.0B
Total Liabilities $
Total Revenue $ 51.1B
Income Before Taxes $ 20.1B
Profit Margins 27.5%

SONY
Market Cap $ 54.8B
Cash & Shrt T Inv $ 11.3B
Total Assets $102.8B
Total Debt $ 9.8B
Total Liabilities $ 73.3B
Total Revenue $ 56.5B
Income Before Taxes $ 0.896B (896M)
Profit Margin 1.54%

Microsoft is valued at 7x that of Sony for mainly two reasons. An unheard of 27% profit margins (PS3 and BD R&D costs have hurt Sony's margins over last 3 years). Also Microsoft has $23 Billion in cash. A $150M "bribe" only cost them 1/2 of 1% of the cash reserve.

I still think the BDA will prevail but lets not try and spin one favorable stat.

[181]

You are right that revenue is not the most important stat. I wanted to highlight that Microsoft isn't dealing with silicon valley startups but rather large corporations.

I don't think that Microsoft, or even Microsoft, Toshiba and Intel combined can compete with the BDA.

[reider]

Boy, I wish the company I work for would join the BDA !
That would be unbeatable...

Hint: 512 Billion dollars Market capitalization.
Sadly, they have no reason to do so....

[2blu2]

Originally Posted by shug7272

Its very easy to give away small percents of your income. I do it everyday to the homless and needy. The point is his small percent is huge. Hes no great savior. He could give away 75% of his income and still be sick rich. So give me a break with what a saint he is. All (most) rich people give to the needy, im sure out of the good of their hearts and not in any way for publicity.

Sorry if it burst your anti-gates bubble.

In 2000 when he started the Charity he had a net worth of about $80 billion and annual income of around $6 billion. He gave $50 billion to his foundation making it the largest charity is the world. This isn't a small percentage.

If you want to do the same thing do either:
1) Give away 65% of your networth (i.e 65% of everything you own).
OR
2) Give away 8x your annual income.

The idea that people do something like this for taxes is also equally ridiculous. You can never save more in taxes then you give away. Mr. Gates is in the 38% tax bracket. So 38% of his income is paid in taxes. On capital gains (which is 99.9999% of his income) he is taxed at a more modest 15%.

Paying taxes and keeping the money cost him:
income 38% of his revenue
capital gains 15% of his revenue

Giving away the money "cost" him:
Income: 100% of what he gives away
Capital Gains: 100% of what he gives away.

In other words for every $1 he gives away he saves 0.15 - 0.38 in taxes but "loses" $1. It is much much cheaper to just keep the money and pay taxes.

[maximiza]

no one really knows where the money is. Switzerland? The Cahman islands? I agree if all is assets were in the US but I don't know if I can buy what you selling.

[tru_to_blu]

I think Bill Gates should donate some of his money to people who really needs it.