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Apple Owns $52.6 Billion In US Treasury Securities, More Than Mexico, Turkey or Norway (cnbc.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the government-debt dept.

randomErr shares a report from CNBC: If Apple were a foreign country, CEO Tim Cook might have considerable political clout in the United States. That's because the tech giant owns $52.6 billion in U.S. Treasury securities, which would rank it among the top 25 major foreign holders, according to estimates from the Treasury Department and Apple's SEC filings released Wednesday. Apple's stake in U.S. government securities as of June, up from $41.7 billion as of last September, puts it ahead of Israel, Mexico and the Netherlands, according to Treasury data released last month, which tracks up to May of this year. With $20.1 billion in short-term Treasury securities and $31.35 billion in long-term marketable Treasury securities, Apple still falls far below countries like China and Japan, which hold over a trillion dollars in U.S. government debt each -- which has caused considerable hand-wringing in Washington. Still, Apple is way above other big companies like Amazon, which owns less than $5 billion in U.S. government or agency securities combined, according to regulatory filings.

5 of 93 comments (clear)

  1. Why is this a problem? by Pfhorrest · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Treasury bonds are an investment instrument. Everybody with a balanced portfolio of investments will have some of them as well as some diversified stocks, in different proportions relative to your investment strategy. Apple just has a fuckton of money, and of course has it invested so it's not losing value while they're not using it, so a significant fraction of that fuckton of money is going to be in treasury bonds.

    That doesn't make the government beholden to Apple or anything. It's not like Apple can say "give me back the money you owe me now, or else". If anything it makes Apple more dependent on the Federal government, and its future ability to pay back its debts.

    --
    -Forrest Cameranesi, Geek of all Trades
    "I am Sam. Sam I am. I do not like trolls, flames, or spam."
    1. Re:Why is this a problem? by 110010001000 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      It is a problem because many of those tens of billions were made by avoiding Federal taxes with financial shell games.

    2. Re:Why is this a problem? by LynnwoodRooster · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Yup. Oh - how much does Apple pay in taxes again?

      100% of all legally owed taxes. And not a penny more. Probably much like you do as well... Unless you willingly forgo legal deductions and tax shelters?

      --
      Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
    3. Re:Why is this a problem? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      And which companies/groups/blocks of people have intentionally bribed... I mean lobbied to have those deductions and tax shelters put in place?

      Standard Oil, Ma Bell, U.S. Steel, DuPont, and their ilk. The computer world joined the big boys after the turn of the century. That scheme was setup long before Bill and Steve had their feud.

    4. Re:Why is this a problem? by geekmux · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Yup. Oh - how much does Apple pay in taxes again?

      100% of all legally owed taxes. And not a penny more. Probably much like you do as well... Unless you willingly forgo legal deductions and tax shelters?

      The average taxpayer doesn't abuse the shit out of offshore tax havens and maintain armies of lobbyists in order to reduce their tax liability from millions to pennies every year.

      If they did, the government would have been broke long ago, so let's just drop the bullshit comparison now. The average taxpayer and a mega-corp aren't even close to the same when it comes to tax liability.