That is one of the most ignorant statements I’ve ever seen posted on Freerepublic. Apple’s assembler and manufacturers which happened to be partially located in China are not even owned by the Chinese Communist Party. The primary assembler is FoxConn Technology Group, which is a subsidiary of Hon Hai, a Taiwan Electronics Contract Assembling Corporation. It is NOT a CCP subsidiary, but does operate factories in China, as well as in Taiwan, Vietnam, India, Brazil, the United States, Ireland, and about a dozen other countries. Apple products are assembled and manufactured in several of those, including the USA. Apple products are actually made of parts manufactured in over 120 countries, many are manufactured in the USA, including major parts.
The profits of ALL the Apple products redound to the benefit of the USA, not China. . . As do the Income Taxes.
So, no, E. Pluribus, it does not benefit the CCP. . . and especially an investment in AAPL does not invest in the CCP as buying AAPL shares does not invest in Apple as Apple is NOT SELLING STOCK! If you buy AAPL, you’re buying stock that Apple issued years ago and is now held by someone else and it is that someone else who will be receiving your investment dollars, not Apple.
In fact, Apple is buying back their stock, and has expended more than $800 billion so far in doing so. Apple has no need to seek new share sales to bring in investors’ money.
Buying Apple products is no different a support for China than buying any of many other consumer electronics devices manufactured of assembled in China, and a lot better than many that are actually OWNED by Chinese Companies which ARE wholly owned by the CCP, such as anything made by Huawei which is owned by the People’s Liberation Army. Huawei products have been found to contain built in spyware for China.
Apple is about the ONLY computer company that still manufactures computers in the USA.
As for investing in China, every time you buy a product manufactured or assembled in China, you are supporting an employee there. That’s true. Apple is moving its assembly out of China as quickly as it can. IPhones are now being assembled in Brazil, India, Vietnam, and Indonesia. FoxConn is building a multi billion dollar plant in Wisconsin. Another expansion is being built in Austin, Texas. Some iMacs are already being assembled in Elk Grove, California, and in Ireland. Mac Pros are being manufactured in Austin, Texas. On the other hand, here is a list of approximately 52 FoxConn contract customers who have contracted to have their products assembled in China:
Here is a partial list of the top ~10% of the ~700 FoxConn's customers I've been able to compile from news articles where their contractural relationships were mentioned over the past five years:
So, Unum, how would be buying any product or investing in any of those stocks be any different, except for the propaganda that’s been published about Apple.
Whatever you say, Chang.