4 ms·

We're going to look back at these insane buys in a few decades as unreasonable, because they simply are. You can have an entire county for $24B.

by 1970-01-01 1y ago

nfriedly 1y ago
Which country? (Not necessarily doubting you, just curious.)
- impossiblefork 1y ago
  25B is the market cap of Ericsson, which is probably responsible for something like 5% of Sweden's GDP. 25B might not be a whole country, but it's definitely a whole country's phone network and internet infrastructure.
  - graemep 1y ago
    There are lots of countries smaller and/or poorer than Sweden. There are a number of very small countries with GDPs in the hundreds of millions of USD range. If you could buy a country for say 10× GDP you are looking at the low billions in GDP which is Bhutan or Zanzibar sized economies. The problem is that countries are not often openly up for sale. You need military or political backing to actually get one. So you cannot literally buy a country. On the other hand, I think it is reasonable to say that this amount of money is the value of an entire small economy, or of the entire stock market of a somewhat bigger one.
    - impossiblefork 1y ago
      >On the other hand, I think it is reasonable to say that this amount of money is the value of an entire small economy, or of the entire stock market of a somewhat bigger one. Yes. I think it's plausible to believe that it's a ridiculous valuation. That whatever the company has can be replicated for less money. That's probably true for many companies, but seeing as Palo Alto Networks probably has some kind of software arm, it seems reasonable to expect that they'd actually have the capacity to get what they want for less.
- 1970-01-01 1y ago
  1. Go shopping https://www.privateislandsonline.com https://www.privateislandsonline.com 2. Use the remaining billions to purchase a military force 3. Declare yourself sovereign 4. Export your goods and services at reasonable prices. 5. Be recognized by international organizations 6. You're literally a country for less than $24B
  - newsclues 1y ago
    You need to largely be self sustaining before step 3, otherwise, even with a military, you are exposed to blockades and attrition.
  - lossolo 1y ago
    > 5. Be recognized by international organizations Good luck with that. No one has been able to do it for decades on unclaimed land like Sealand or Liberland. And you want to essentially annex another country's territory by force and be recognized? That's pure fantasy.
    - 1970-01-01 1y ago
      It happens every decade: https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/newest-countries https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/newest-co...
      - lossolo 1y ago
        That's not an argument made in good faith. You call the collapse of the USSR into Russia a "new country"? How many of these so called "new" countries are just single billionaires annexing some island they bought and being recognized by international institutions? I'll tell you how many: exactly zero. Total fantasy.
        1970-01-01 1y ago
        Ok let's take a step back. Get a .int domain by doing something scientific. Build CERN 2.0 on your new land and you're going to be very welcomed by other countries. It should only cost 8-9B for that and then this step is complete.
seydor 1y ago
Try to cash out that pile of stocks and instantly the bubble pops. The values are virtual
- gjfkririfif 1y ago
  [flagged]
- alecco 1y ago
  AFAIK since incomes are stagnant, tax revenue is very dependent on capital gains. Governments and central banks can't afford to let the stock and real estate bubbles pop. Governments need taxes to a) keep the circus going and b) paying interests on the growing debt (a good chunk of it is held by the central bank).
esafak 1y ago
No, we won't. As long as productivity continues to increase, so will market caps. Some countries are just left behind.

We're going to look back at these insane buys in a few decades as unreasonable, because they simply are. You can have an entire county for $24B.

nfriedly 1y ago

Which country? (Not necessarily doubting you, just curious.)

impossiblefork 1y ago
25B is the market cap of Ericsson, which is probably responsible for something like 5% of Sweden's GDP. 25B might not be a whole country, but it's definitely a whole country's phone network and internet infrastructure.
- graemep 1y ago
  There are lots of countries smaller and/or poorer than Sweden. There are a number of very small countries with GDPs in the hundreds of millions of USD range. If you could buy a country for say 10× GDP you are looking at the low billions in GDP which is Bhutan or Zanzibar sized economies. The problem is that countries are not often openly up for sale. You need military or political backing to actually get one. So you cannot literally buy a country. On the other hand, I think it is reasonable to say that this amount of money is the value of an entire small economy, or of the entire stock market of a somewhat bigger one.
  - impossiblefork 1y ago
    >On the other hand, I think it is reasonable to say that this amount of money is the value of an entire small economy, or of the entire stock market of a somewhat bigger one. Yes. I think it's plausible to believe that it's a ridiculous valuation. That whatever the company has can be replicated for less money. That's probably true for many companies, but seeing as Palo Alto Networks probably has some kind of software arm, it seems reasonable to expect that they'd actually have the capacity to get what they want for less.
1970-01-01 1y ago
1. Go shopping https://www.privateislandsonline.com https://www.privateislandsonline.com 2. Use the remaining billions to purchase a military force 3. Declare yourself sovereign 4. Export your goods and services at reasonable prices. 5. Be recognized by international organizations 6. You're literally a country for less than $24B
- newsclues 1y ago
  You need to largely be self sustaining before step 3, otherwise, even with a military, you are exposed to blockades and attrition.
- lossolo 1y ago
  > 5. Be recognized by international organizations Good luck with that. No one has been able to do it for decades on unclaimed land like Sealand or Liberland. And you want to essentially annex another country's territory by force and be recognized? That's pure fantasy.
  - 1970-01-01 1y ago
    It happens every decade: https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/newest-countries https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/newest-co...
    - lossolo 1y ago
      That's not an argument made in good faith. You call the collapse of the USSR into Russia a "new country"? How many of these so called "new" countries are just single billionaires annexing some island they bought and being recognized by international institutions? I'll tell you how many: exactly zero. Total fantasy.
      - 1970-01-01 1y ago
        Ok let's take a step back. Get a .int domain by doing something scientific. Build CERN 2.0 on your new land and you're going to be very welcomed by other countries. It should only cost 8-9B for that and then this step is complete.

seydor 1y ago

Try to cash out that pile of stocks and instantly the bubble pops. The values are virtual

gjfkririfif 1y ago
[flagged]
alecco 1y ago
AFAIK since incomes are stagnant, tax revenue is very dependent on capital gains. Governments and central banks can't afford to let the stock and real estate bubbles pop. Governments need taxes to a) keep the circus going and b) paying interests on the growing debt (a good chunk of it is held by the central bank).

esafak 1y ago

No, we won't. As long as productivity continues to increase, so will market caps. Some countries are just left behind.