There is no ever fountain spring of money and time which is exactly what buying a company is. You have to throw lawyers and time and effort into it. Assuming yo

There is no ever fountain spring of money and time which is exactly what buying a company is. You have to throw lawyers and time and effort into it. Assuming you did have Apple's cash balance, lets say you did try to spend it all.... what then happens to next years class of startups/smaller companies? Apple's $billions cash pile isn't all acquired in 1 year but over the past decade. Furthermore, once you buy it you have to spend mental energy integrating the purchase into the company. Do you really believe all the shareholders and stakeholders are all down for that massive distraction? There is a weird chain of thoughts that needs to be interrupted here. Someone I spoke to earlier this year was essentially saying the same thing about Rockefeller, "well he was buying up all the smaller oil fields and producers!". Well, if you did hear that was happening wouldn't you yourself go out and try to strike more oil fields to be bought out quickly? Furthermore, what do you do when the massive fields in the middle east were found? Do you expect Rockefeller to start heading over there buying up the entire region to shore up the U.S market? This is quickly becoming an argument that defeats basic reasoning and basic reason.